Glossary
Turnaround time (TAT)
Turnaround time (TAT) is how long a transcriber or service takes to deliver a finished transcript after an order is received. Court schedules define it in calendar days or hours, counted from the order.
Updated October 17, 20263 cited facts, each traced to its source
Also called TAT.
Turnaround time, or TAT, is the time between receiving an order for a transcript and delivering it. A short TAT means the text arrives quickly, and a long one means you wait longer, usually at a lower price. The clearest public definitions come from court transcript schedules, which name each delivery window.
Court schedules define turnaround as a delivery window
The U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York publishes a schedule of transcript categories, each defined by how long delivery may take. Three of them show the range:
- Ordinary: delivered within thirty calendar days after the order 1.
- Expedited: delivered within seven calendar days after the order 2.
- Hourly: a transcript of proceedings delivered within two hours of the order 3.
These windows are a court's rules, not a universal standard. Other courts and later years can set different categories and prices, so check the schedule for the court you order from.
Example: ordering a transcript on Monday
Suppose you order a transcript of a hearing on a Monday. Under the ordinary category, the court has up to thirty calendar days to deliver it. Under the expedited category, the schedule requires delivery within seven calendar days, so you pay more for the shorter wait. The category you pick sets the deadline, not the length of the recording.
Why it matters for dictation and typing work
TAT sets the pace of transcription work. A short TAT leaves less time per recording, so a transcriptionist who is paid by the job or by the line has to type faster or accept less work. Our guide to transcription jobs explains how pay and turnaround interact, and human vs AI transcription compares speed and accuracy.
Automatic transcription removes most of the typing time, so its turnaround depends on processing and review rather than on typing speed. Whatever the method, the finished transcript still needs checking before it is delivered. For a free way to turn an audio file into text in your browser, see audio to text.
Related terms
- Transcriptionist: the person who types the transcript within the agreed turnaround.
- Verbatim transcription: a style that takes longer to produce than clean verbatim, which affects TAT.
- Clean verbatim: an edited style that is usually quicker to deliver.
Evidence
Every number on this page, with where it comes from. Open a fact to see the exact words in its source.
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Related terms
- Transcription: How to Turn Audio and Video Into TextThe topic this term belongs to
- Clean verbatimClean verbatim is a transcript that removes filler words, stutters, repetitions and false starts while keeping the speaker's wording and meaning. It is the usual choice for reading, captions and coding, where hesitations add noise rather than information.
- Closed captions (CC)Closed captions (CC) are a text version of a program's dialogue and relevant sounds that the viewer can turn on or off. The word closed means the viewer chooses whether to see them, which separates them from open captions.
- Forced alignmentForced alignment is the process of matching a known transcript to its audio so that each word or phone gets a start and end time. Unlike open speech recognition, it does not decide what was said; it only finds when each word was said.
- Open captionsOpen captions are text drawn onto the frames of a video, so every viewer sees them and nobody can switch them off. They are also called burned-in captions or hardcoded subtitles.
- SubRip subtitle file (SRT)A SubRip subtitle file, or SRT, is a plain-text file of numbered caption blocks. Each block has a start and end time in hours, minutes, seconds and milliseconds, followed by the caption text. It is one of the most common caption formats on the internet.
- Subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing (SDH)SDH stands for subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing. They show the dialogue plus the sound effects, music and speaker identification that a hearing viewer would get from the soundtrack.
- Timestamp (transcription)A timestamp in a transcript is a time marker, such as 00:12:15, that shows when the nearby text was spoken in the recording. Timestamps let readers jump to a passage, and they can be attached to whole segments or to single words, with different accuracy.
- Transcription foot pedalA transcription foot pedal is a switch that controls audio playback with the foot, so a transcriber can start, pause and rewind a recording while typing. It is also called a foot control or foot pedal.
- TranscriptionistA transcriptionist is a person who listens to recorded speech and types it as text, such as a clinician's dictated report. Speech recognition now writes first drafts, so much of the work has shifted to checking and correcting machine text.
- Verbatim transcriptionVerbatim transcription writes down exactly what is said, including filler words, false starts, repetitions and non-speech sounds, with no tidying. Researchers and legal teams use it when the way someone speaks is part of the record.
- WebVTT (VTT)WebVTT (Web Video Text Tracks, usually shortened to VTT) is a plain-text file format for timed captions and subtitles on the web. A .vtt file is a list of cues, and each cue gives a start time, an end time and the text to show.