Clean verbatim vs full verbatim for transcription freelancers (examples + payouts)
When to strip fillers, keep false starts, and escalate uncertain audio—tie choices to reviewer expectations before you invoice.
Clean verbatim vs full verbatim is the divider most reviewers cite when rejecting work. Clean keeps meaning-first readability: fillers and obvious stumbles go away unless they matter legally or narratively. Full verbatim traps every audible disfluency—common on legal transcripts, tightly scoped corpora, or client PDFs that spell out “no omission.”
Signals to resolve before QC
- Filler ladders (“like,” “you know”) — remove or retain?
- False starts that finish later— mirror both or tighten?
- Laughter and environmental tags— newline, brackets, timestamps?
- Digits spelled out vs normalized numerals.
Preset cards in VideoText
The marketplace presets inside Format → Client guidelines summarise how each vendor typically treats those bullets. Edit the cards when your PDF contradicts defaults; the Edited badges show exactly what drifted—handy during disputes.
Read the Rev playbook next: Rev-style preset workflow → · QA glossary: what transcript QA covers →.