Many court reporters use scopists which enable them to take more depositions while having a scopist do their editing. It is very important when a court reporter starts working with a scopist to give them guidelines regarding how they need their transcript produced. Every agency has different requirements. It is also important to give the scopist some basics regarding how the court reporter wants their parentheticals to read. I have seen the simple words “discussion off the record” go from one line to two lines and even three lines. Each agency has its own ideas on how these simple parentheticals should appear in the transcript. In addition, the reporter should have some written guidelines for simple punctuation and numbers. This will result in consistency throughout the transcript. A court reporter should be aware that it takes time for a scopist to understand their own style, and it is important to give a new scopist guidelines which will make everybody’s job a lot easier.