Each year the team at Independent Reporters gives back to the community. Usually our main drive is at Christmas, but we know that many organizations need useful items all year.
With that in mind, our team of court reporters and staff gave back in a different way this year. Instead of just one season, we spread it down over the entire year. From clothing to food donations to fresh vegetables and fruit from our gardens, the team at IR provided various items throughout 2017. Here’s what we gave back to various organizations:
Bissell Centre
– 150 pairs of socks
– 50 pairs of underwear
– 20 T-Shirts
– 5 pairs of shoes
– 2 jackets
WIN House
– 20 pairs of children’s socks
– 20 pairs of children’s underwear
– 30 children’s shirts
– 30 toothbrushes
– 30 tubes of toothpaste
– 20 bottles shampoo
– 20 bottles conditioner
Edmonton Food Bank
– 75 cans of soup
– 30 cans of pork & beans
– 40 boxes Kraft dinner
– 25 jars spaghetti sauce
– 50 lbs of pasta
Meals on Wheels Over 500 lbs of fresh produce from the gardens of our staff which included tomatoes, zuchinni, cucumbers, carrots and raspberries.
Now that we’re seeing some really nice, hot weather, one thing to keep in mind is if you’re travelling with your pets in your vehicle. The Calgary Humane Society has a great article on things to keep in mind if you leave your pet in your car. And remember, they are using temperatures of 26 celcius. This week we are expecting 30+, so these numbers increase that much more.
My Human is Zack (Manager, Client Services)
Not only is it cruel to leave your pet in a parked vehicle in these temperatures, worst-case scenario could also leave you with some legal issues, fines, or even criminal charges. So, be smart, read this article, and then have a better understanding of what you should and should not do.
Did you know that Independent Reporters provides donations to both the Calgary Humane Society and the Edmonton Humane Society. Each year we track the number of online bookings our clients make through our web site and donate $1 for each day clients schedule court reporting services. Next time you are looking to book a court reporter, do keep us in mind and book online. That way we can continue to provide yearly support to these two great Humane Societies!
Effective August 1, 2017, Edmonton Independent Reporters (IR) will move to our new premises located at:
730, 9707 110 Street NW Edmonton, AB T5K 2L9
Phone numbers remain the same
The new facilities will provide clients with modern amenities and enhanced services in a very comfortable environment.
Getting to our new office is easier as well. Located in the Government District, this will provide easier access to clients coming from the downtown core. Underground paid parking as well as street and surface parking are easily accessible. And to make it even easier, clients can take the LRT and have a short walk from the Grandin LRT Station to our new building.
Updated access for clients with enhanced video and realtime court reporting services will be just some of the added improvements that will benefit litigators when they host services in our new Edmonton office. The team of experienced and professional court reporters we continue to provide to litigation counsel in Edmonton will continue to provide top-notch services as we always have.
It’s been a while, but both our Alberta NHL teams, the Calgary Flames and the Edmonton Oilers, are in the 2017 Stanley Cup Playoffs!
For both our offices, this means a bit of a rivalry. Although they are not playing against each other – yet – it does mean that the trash talking will begin as each game is played and each team wins or loses.
The best part, should both our teams move out of the first round and continue on to the second, they will face each other. This means the Battle of Alberta will once again happen and bring on one of the best rivalries in hockey. We all remember from the past just how much each city hates the other’s team, so much is being hoped for in both the Oilers and Flames advancing to face-off against each other as they have in the past.
All of us here at Calgary and Edmonton Independent Reporters will be very excited to see this happen and see whose team will get bragging rights over the other.
With many people travelling to Calgary for depositions hosted in our Calgary offices, or major law firms, the next question that is always asked after scheduling court reporting services – Where should I stay?
Now you can easily see which hotels are located close to our office, or choose your favourite brand from the list of hotels here.
Calgary is a vibrant city and, business-wise, best known for being the leader in the energy industry in Canada. Most of the head offices for companies in the oil and gas industry call Calgary home.
Think about scheduling your visit before or after the weekend so that you can take an extra day or two to see what else our area has to offer. Banff National Park, a worldwide tourist destination, is just over an hour away from downtown Calgary and offers some of the most breathtaking scenery anywhere on this planet. Just ask any of our team and we will be happy to point you in the direction you may want to head and explore.
Calgary Independent Reporters will be moving our office as of the end of November, 2016. Renovations of our new facilities are nearly complete and we are very excited to host clients once everything is complete. Our new address is 228, 404 6 Avenue SW.
The new offices are more centrally located and are closer to major hotels in downtown Calgary. Once the work is all completed the new space will provide clients with larger boardrooms and enhanced technologies to provide even more court reporting and legal services with ease. From modern and ergonomic seating in our boardrooms to full technical integration of discovery services, the new offices will provide clients with new levels of comfort and ease of accessing services provided by our court reporters.
IR is also updating our video conferencing systems in the new office. We made the move last year to HD, but the new boardrooms will feature even better video quality. Our main boardroom will now boast a 108″ screen to provide a feeling of truly “being there” even though you have not left Calgary.
We’re almost there! Once we have the new furniture arrives we will provide pictures of our new space.
We look forward to hosting our Calgary clients as well as our out-of-town clients in our new facilities very soon. If you need to schedule services you can use our online booking form – https://indreporters.com/book-online/
As of today, when you call Independent Reporters, you will be greeted by our automated phone attendant and given three options on what you would like to do. This will make it easier for you to directed right to the person that coordinates the services that you wish to schedule. With having offices in both Calgary and Edmonton, some things were a bit redundant and we needed to streamline things for our clients. For example, our Edmonton office coordinates all reporter scheduling while the Calgary office coordinates all matters technical. Introducing the new phone system will route our clients right to the person that you need to speak with and provide more immediate service for your requests.
Pressing 1 will likely be the main option you will use. This will take you directly to our staff who will schedule your upcoming court reporting and video conferencing service requests. This is also the same team that can assist you with any transcript questions.
Pressing 3will take you to the person best able to help you with any technical support areas for video conferencing and legal video services.
While out of order here in the list, pressing 2takes you to the staff members that handle and coordinate CART and captioning services for clients. For our legal clients, this is best used when you have a hard-of-hearing person that needs realtime accessibility in a proceeding.
After updating our web site this past fall, we had some occasional issues with the online booking form not working correctly. We have done a major overhaul to what we had and, we are happy to say, that the online booking for is now fixed, updated, and easier to use than before.
Now when you schedule court reporters in either Calgary or Edmonton, the form is quicker for you to use. We’ve also added a much simpler way to pick dates from an online calendar which now includes a start and end date for the booking.
After you have entered the information, a detailed confirmation is now sent to you after you click on the Submit button. Previously you just received a message that the scheduling information was sent. As usual, our office will also send an official confirmation so that you know it has been inputted and you will have a court reporter for the day(s) you requested.
One last thing we want to make sure you know about, for every online booking that you schedule through IR, we provide a $1.00 donation to the Humane Society in the city that you schedule services. In 2015 our clients scheduled 396 online bookings through the IR web site, so we rounded-up and provided the Humane Societies with $400. The more you schedule online, the more we will send next year!
Our online booking form for scheduling court reporting services in Calgary and Edmonton was having some issues this past little while. Well, that is now all fixed, we are happy to say!
And, while we fixed that error, we also updated a few things on the scheduling form. You now have more options to choose from when scheduling specific services, which include court reporting, court reporting with realtime, court reporting and legal video services, court reporting, legal video & video conferencing or just video conference services. We think this will make it a bit cleaner and easier to work with for you.
As always, when you do schedule services with IR, you will get a confirmation email back from us, then a confirmation PDF file that outlines all the details you provided when you booked a court reporter.
Remember, if you do need a court reporter within the next 24 hours, we always recommend that you call us. This way, just in case something just doesn’t work correctly, we will make sure that you have services scheduled as you need.
Being a court reporting company in Canada we also provide deposition services to attorneys in the United States. One thing that someone reviewing a deposition transcript is the Canadian spellings of words versus how they are spelled in the U.S.
In Canada we primarily use British spellings, but some words may also incorporate U.S. spellings. American spelling of words were originally based off of the British spelling, but over time grammarists in the United States have made the words spelled more like they sound.
Well, Canadians don’t follow ALL British spelling rules, such as the two below:
gaol (British) jail (Canada/U.S.)
tyre (British) tire (Canada/U.S.)
However, in many other instances, Canadians do tend to use the spelling in the same manner as the British. In many ways this does help to offer some clarity when reading text in a transcript.
Here are two words in the sentences below that use Canadian/British spellings in a sentence:
The electric meter on the house is approximately 1.2 metres from ground level.
and Let me check with the office to see if the cheque was mailed out to you.
In the first sentence, if this text was being produced by a court reporter in the U.S., the word, meter/metre, would be simply put in as meter. However, in Canada, we use different spellings for each. Meter – a device used to measure usage is different from metre, which is spelling used to measure distance. You can see how this actually helps to provide the reader with a better understanding of which meter refers to what form of measurement.
The second example is check and cheque. The word cheque refers to a form of payment while check refers to an action of confirmation.
Other words used in Canadian spellings that maintain the British rules are -our words, such as colour and neighbour. Also, words with -ing endings will double the “l”, such as travelling.
Court reporters with our firm maintain a listing of other unique words that are spelled using the Canadian/British spellings. Our go-to reference dictionary at Calgary/Edmonton Independent Reporters is the Canadian Oxford Dictionary. There is a great video on the Oxford Blog – British & American Spellings that provides even more information on differences in Canadian/British and U.S. spellings. Check it out and you will see why we spell words the way we do.
Now, the next time you receive a transcript from a court reporter in Canada and notice some different spellings, you will have a better understanding on why we spell some words just a little bit different than you.
Since it is Earth Day today, the question to us always comes up, Can a court reporting company be friendly to the environment? Yes, we can, and we are! Both Calgary and Edmonton Independent Reporters are Certified Green by the NNRC Green Commission.
People are curious to know how, in an industry that is very tied to paper transcripts, what was done to be a green company. Independent Reporters undertook the challenge of the NNRC Green Commission to meet their standards and become the first, and ONLY, court reporting company in Canada to be certified green! The management team at IR felt it was the right thing to do to reduce the impact we make on the environment. We know our industry creates a lot of waste, but by making changes in both our Calgary and Edmonton offices, we are doing our part to minimize our footprint on the planet.
What Did We Do To Go Green?
Here is a brief summary of some of the steps IR took to receive our Green Certification.
Promote paperless transcripts
Print all transcripts two-sided (have been since 1996)
Use minimum 30% recycled paper for transcripts
In-house recycling program for all recyclables
Use electronic memos/emails instead of paper
Turn off all non-essential equipment at night
Use e-waste programs for all electronic disposal
Replace computer equipment with Energy Star equipment
Use recycled paper for letterhead and promo material
Replace all office lighting with energy efficient lights
Use power saving features on computers/printers
Promote staff to work from home where possible
What are the benefits to our clients?
By using Independent Reporters for your court reporting services you can do help us to help the environment. When you place a Green Order you will receive a $15.00 credit on your invoice for each transcript that you order, plus there are also no delivery charges. Please note that if you were the examiner and ordered, then we will still need to deliver the original paper transcript to you for filing purposes. This will incur a delivery charge
Contact us to learn more first-hand about our green court reporting services.
Have you ever needed to look for court reporting services outside of the province of Alberta? If so, what do you do? A Google search? Perfect! But how do you know if the firm is reliable, professional and will provide you with the services you are accustomed to here in Alberta?
Schedule Court Reporting Services Worldwide With IR
Very simple! Just call IR!
Calgary/Edmonton Independent Reporters is part of the National Network of Reporting Companies, NNRC. Similar to legal networks such as Meritas or TagLaw, NNRC is a partnership of more than 50 independent court reporting companies in Canada, the United States, and Europe.
If you need to schedule a court reporter in Toronto, New York, Chicago, Miami or London, instead of doing an online search and trying to find a firm that is reputable, just contact IR instead. We will take all the guesswork out of the search hassle for you and personally arrange the court reporting services, legal video or realtime court reporting services you will need in the city you are travelling to. This way you deal with who you are used to using here at home, Independent Reporters.
The firms in the NNRC network are leading companies in their locations and provide excellent services. And once they are finished providing the transcript services, we can even arrange to handle all aspects of delivering the transcript to you.
No worries, no hassles, and it saves you time. Just think of us as your court reporting concierge!
You may have heard the words, “realtime court reporting services,” thrown around before, but what exactly is it? Let’s define this so that it is the clear definition for what a client would use, this being a lawyer in a discovery, deposition, members of a board hearing, or a judge in a trial.
The simple description of realtime reporting services is the ability for a lawyer or attorney to be able to view the live testimony on a laptop or tablet as it is being written by a court reporter.
But let’s look a bit further at this and ask, Why would I use this? Why would I not just wait for the transcript to be delivered or just get a rough file at the end of the day? Do I need realtime services for my upcoming file?
Why use realtime court reporting services? Did you know that hearing, and reading, the answers from a witness provides better understanding of the testimony. This can help you to focus on what a witness may not be comprehending and continue to review that area further.
You can add a quick mark to the live evidence as it is being said, right on the screen. A quick mark is akin to adding a highlight mark to a page of the transcript to come back to later. This makes it easier for you to focus on the answers given instead of writing notes. You can also search these quick marks during the testimony or at a break to check on things that you may want to explore further.
IR generally suggests using realtime court reporting services for proceedings that are lengthy so that your evening preparation time is reduced or the examination has a matter of urgency associated with it, such as an application to the court the next day. This way you have all the information as it happens, live, instead of waiting until the end of the day to review a rough draft of the transcript or waiting longer for the certified transcript to be provided by the court reporter.
What do you need? Today, IR makes it so simple to use our realtime court reporting services. We currently have three of our court reporters that are set up to provide realtime at any discovery. They are equipped with iPads already loaded with software. Or, if you have your own laptop or tablet with you, you can easily connect to our own wireless connection with the reporter. Receive the access to our wireless router, open your browser, enter the URL your court reporter provides and in a moment you will have realtime streaming right to your own device. No software, no wires.
Want to learn more, have a demo, or a luncheon session with key staff? Contact IR at: Calgary – 403.265.2550 Edmonton – 780.488.1464 Nationwide – 800.340.1352
The IR Blog will be a place where our legal clients, legal assistants, paralegals, and anyone else interested in court reporting or the legal industry can come to meet and learn about happenings in our industry. We’ll make sure to keep you updated with information on what is going on with us, new technologies, and even other areas of interest that we feel may be helpful. Feel free to stop by and learn more on IR and what we do, what we offer, and what we like.
