Terms & Conditions

Opening Hours

Our normal office hours are from 9am to 5.30pm. However we are able to receive material at our central London delivery point between 8.30am & 7pm Mon-Fri, 11am to 6pm Saturdays, and 12noon to 6pm Sundays. We are able to receive work via our FTP site at any time of day or night.

Turnaround Times

Our services are available on various turnaround times (5 day, 4 day, 3 day, 2 day, next day and less than 24hours).

The number of days refers to working days only. The deadline is calculated by counting the number of days following the day of receipt of material. Whilst we fully appreciate the importance of your deadlines, and will use our best endeavours to achieve them, we cannot 100% guarantee the same and cannot take responsibility for problems outside of our control (e.g. power cut, bandwidth contention, problem with ISP, unforeseen technical issue) which may cause a delay. Material received before 7pm is classed as being received on that day. For example:

Material received:	Turnaround requested:	Transcripts emailed by:
Tues 10am	2 day	Thur 5.30pm
Wed 6.30pm	next day	Thur 5.30pm
Frid 12pm	3 day	Wed 5.30pm
Thurs 7pm	less than 24hours	Fri midday

The "transcript emailed by" dates are the outside times we work to, if your booking form specifies a certain time we will do our best to meet your requirement. We email transcripts through as soon as they are completed (we do not wait for them all to be completed before sending them to you).

Please note that we agree to deadlines based on the time you estimate the material to arrive with us. If the material is delayed it may not be possible to meet the deadline originally agreed. If this occurs we will always discuss your options with you.

Layout and format of transcript

Our protocol is to produce one transcript per roll. Should you require something different - for example one roll split into two transcripts, or interviewees from separate rolls merged into one transcript, this should be requested. We will only charge extra should this take a significant amount of time to administer. You will be advised if that is the case.

Script Delivery

Please spell your email address(es) carefully on the booking form, as these determine the safe arrival of your transcripts.

We are quick to respond if we get a bounce-back, and will ring you immediately to check the spelling of your email address(es). However, if we do not get a bounce-back, we will always assume you have received the scripts.

In the unlikely event that your transcripts do not arrive on time, please call us immediately on 0800 0854418.

Transfer charges

All material submitted to us in a physical format is subject to a transfer fee of £2.50 per tape, with the exception of DVCams which are subject to a transfer fee of £8.00 per tape. This includes both tapes which are found to contain no dialogue, and also tapes which are faulty.

Please note that we assume no liability for any tapes including masters which are broken or damaged during the transfer process.

For material submitted to us digitally, where rolls are made up of multiple files each file is subject to an administration fee of £2.50 per file.

The following file formats are subject to a conversion fee of £60 per hour of our time: Flash video (.flv), Flash Audio (.fla) and .mp4 files

Tape Durations

Pre-edited Material:
Please aim to keep the content of tapes to a maximum of 60 minutes of footage per tape. If you send us more than 60 minutes of footage per tape, you may be charged a surcharge, which you will be advised of. When sending us audio cassettes, please only record dialogue onto one side of the audio cassette.

Finished Programmes:
Please supply us with one tape per programme. If you send us more than one episode per tape you may be charged a surcharge which you will be advised of. If your programme is particularly long in duration we do prefer to receive it all on one tape.

Faulty tapes

If we discover that your tape is faulty, we will inform you as soon as possible and advise you.

Poor labelling and/or reliable tape log

Any job requiring extra time either for administration or having to scan material for any reason, will be subject to a surcharge. You will be advised of any such surcharge. For example due to:

Poor tape labelling
Unclear tape log
Unreliable tape log
No tape log on large jobs (ie over 10 rolls)
Consistently faulty tapes

Timecode

We can handle all types of timecode. However, please note if the timecode on your footage is not continuous (eg time of day timecode), and you don't forewarn us, you may be liable for a surcharge to cover the extra time this takes us. NB: There is a specific question on the booking form regarding time of day timecode.

Material quality

Our prices are based on the assumption that source material contains clear, professionally recorded audio. Any job where the quality of the material results in the transcription taking significantly longer than usual will be subject to a surcharge. You will be advised of any such surcharge. Examples of such occasions include:

Poorly miked material
Heavy background noise
Technical problems interfering with the material quality
Poorly recorded mini & micro cassettes
Heavy foreign accents

Minimum charges

Transcription of unedited material is charged at a rate per 1000 words. If you only require certain sections to be transcribed, please supply us with explicit and accurate timecodes indicating these exact sections. If you are unable to supply us with these timecode references, a minimum charge of 1000 words per 10 minutes of recording will be made.

A minimum charge per job will be applied as follows:

Transcription of Unedited Material: £50
TX01 & TX02 Scripts: £50
TX03 & TX04 Script: £75

Editing & Reversions

We charge on an hourly rate for editing and reversions as follows:

5 day turnaround: £40 per hour
4 day turnaround: £45 per hour
3 day turnaround: £50 per hour
2 day turnaround: £55 per hour
next day turnaround: £60 per hour

Hard Copies of Transcripts & CDs

Our charges are as follows:

Print out of a hard copy of your transcript: 20p per page + postage
CD containing your transcript: £5.00 per CD + postage

Cancellation Fee

Once you have booked in your job with us it will be included onto our system and typist capacity will be assigned to it. For our "less than 24 hour" and "next day" service, cancellation fees will apply as follows:

Less than 24 hours notice:50% of total cost
Between 24 & 48 hours notice: 25% of total cost.

(If unedited material and therefore on 1000 word rate, an estimated value is calculated using an average of 8,000 words per hour of footage).

Transmission scripts

Our transmission scripts are successfully delivered to a wide variety of broadcasters. We have adapted the layout and content of transmission scripts in accordance with what we understand broadcasters' requirements to be. However we strongly suggest you check the exact delivery requirements stated by your broadcaster in order to ensure that you select the transmission script which best meets their needs, and we do not accept liability if our script does not exactly meet their requirement. Examples of our transmission scripts can be viewed on this website under Services / Post Production Scripts.

On occasions the BITC can cause a caption to become illegible. On these occasions we indicate as such within the body of the script.

Please note that Rough Cuts will be treated as a Transmission Script 01 and charged accordingly.

Translations:

As with our transcripts in English, a 25% surcharge may be added for unclear or unprofessionally recorded audio, or for non-studio or poorly miked interviews.

A minimum charge of 1000 words applies for each job booked in and a minimum charge of 500 words per roll or document applies.

We must be given clear instructions as to what is and is not to be translated and if in and out timecodes are not supplied we cannot be held responsible for wrong sections translated. ie. if only certain sections are required, you should endeavour to provide in and out timecodes.

When we charge you on an hourly rate, we will give an estimate of time that the translation will take before the job is started. This is only an estimate and we cannot be held responsible if the final number of hours the job takes is different from the estimate.

Bike request service

This service is available for collection between 9am and 5pm Monday to Friday, and is available to London based clients only. The service is charged as follows:

Central London: £15 per collection
Outside Central London: £20 per collection

"Central London" postcodes include: W1; W2; W3; W4; W6; W8; W9; W10; W11; W12; W14; SW1; SW2; SW3; SW4; SW5; SW6; SW7; SW8; SW9; SW10; SW11; SW12; SW13; SW14; SW15; SW16; SW17; SW18; SW19; EC1; EC2; EC3; EC4; WC1; WC2; N1; N2; N3; N4; N5; N6; N7; N8; N9; N10; N15; N16; N19; N22; E1; E2; E3; E5; E8; E9; E10; E14; E15; E16; SE1; SE4; SE5; SE8; SE10; SE11; SE14; SE15; SE16; SE17

"Outside Central London" postcodes include: W5, W;7; W13; SW20; N9; N11; N12; N13; N14; N17; N18; N20; N21; E4; E6; E7; E11; E12; E13; E17; E18; SE2; SE3; SE6; SE7; SE9; SE12; SE13; SE18; SE19:

We reserve the right to apply an additional charge in the following circumstances: Waiting time is accumulated; The collection time changes; Request for collection is cancelled.

Tape return

We assume no liability for tapes (including master tapes) lost to or from our premises or broken or damaged during the transcription process. We advise you not to send us your master tapes but rather to send us copies. We aim to return your tapes to you via recorded post or courier, within two working days following completion of your transcription. If you require them urgently please specify when booking the job in with us.

Collection of your tapes from the Strand is not an option. If you require them to be returned, we will always arrange the most cost effective way of returning your tapes to you and add the cost to your invoice.

Invoicing

All prices quoted are exclusive of VAT. Work will be invoiced on completion of the job. Our payment terms are strictly 30 days net. If payment has not been made within 30 days we reserve the right to apply interest at a rate of 2% above base rate.

Confidentiality

All work is strictly confidential and if required, a confidentiality agreement can be signed.

Our guarantee

We guarantee to supply you with accurate transcripts to the best of our abilities. Our typists and production team are highly experienced. Should however you have any complaints regarding the quality of our work or service please direct them to either Dom Bourne (Managing Director) or Louise Tapia (Operations Director).

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