Automatic transcription: what it is and how to use it

Today's transcription models recognise Italian well, often tell who is speaking and add punctuation. The text they produce can then be summarised, searched, translated or turned into minutes with a language model.

Some transcription models also run locally, on the company's own computer, and this matters when the recordings contain confidential data.

An example in an SMB

A renovation company records the first site visit, with the client's consent. In a few minutes the transcript becomes a list of requested jobs, which the surveyor checks and uses as the basis for the quote. No more lost notes.

The most common mistakes

• Recording without saying so: people must be informed and, in the cases required, give their consent.
• Blindly trusting proper names, acronyms and numbers: these are the parts transcription gets wrong most often.
• Uploading confidential recordings to free services without reading the terms.
• Storing transcripts without deciding how long to keep them and who can read them: they often contain personal data.

Why it matters to you

Meetings, site visits, phone calls with suppliers: in many businesses the important information is passed on by word of mouth and gets lost. Transcription turns it into a document you can search months later. The biggest benefit is not the text itself, but what you do with it afterwards: minutes, task lists, replies to clients.

All the AI terms explained simply are in the glossary.