Voice input for an auditor

Potok transcribes Russian speech; this site has been translated into English for convenience.

An auditor who prepares an audit opinion, working papers or a letter to management usually types such texts by hand. Voice input speeds up dictation: Potok (potok.now) inserts text into any field, and the model is trained for Russian speech, including terms like materiality and audit risk. Potok has a WER of 2.1% on our GolosTest benchmark.

An auditor formulates reports, working papers and letters to management precisely, and here it is important not to lose the legal precision of the wording. Is it worth trusting voice input with texts where every word carries weight, and where to start if you decide to try?

What an auditor should check before voice input of documents

Before dictating an auditor's working papers, it is worth going through several points, from the terms of the profession to the confidentiality of information and the recording hotkey itself.

1. Terms of the profession. Materiality, audit risk, sampling and similar words are recognized by Potok with a model trained for Russian speech, including terms; for abbreviations and specific names that are needed often, there is a personal dictionary in the Pro plan.
2. Audit secrecy. The audit organization, an individual auditor and their employees are obliged to keep confidential the information that makes up audit secrecy (Art. 9 307-FZ, on audit activity). This should be considered before dictating such information into any program: audio and transcripts are stored on servers in Russia.
3. Recording hotkey. By default it is Ctrl+Space; if the combination is taken in the work program where the audit opinion is prepared, it is changed in the settings to any other key combination or a side mouse button, and then there is no conflict.
4. Text formatting. Punctuation, capital letters and numbers are placed by it automatically, amounts and percentages in the opinion too, without a separate command.
5. Internet connection. Without it recognition does not run; if a recording was still made, it stays in the history, and it can be recognized again when the connection returns.

Doctors face a similar question about secrecy and terms, and there is a review for them in the article on dictation for a doctor.

Where to start in the first week of dictation

The first week with Potok is worth testing on texts that do not fall under audit secrecy: drafts, internal notes, letters without client data. This makes it easier to get used to the hotkey and notice which terms are worth adding to the personal dictionary. The default hotkey is Ctrl+Space, and it can be changed at once in the settings to a convenient combination or a side mouse button if it is already taken in the work program. It is useful in these same days to estimate how many words usually go into one audit opinion or a letter to management, so it is clearer whether the free limit is enough or Pro is needed at once. 2500 words per week are available for free on one device, which is usually enough for testing, while for daily dictation of an auditor's working papers Pro may be needed. A similar review of terms and a dictionary for a profession exists for programmers too, in the article on voice input for programmers.

Where it is better to stay on the keyboard

Potok is a cloud service: the voice goes for recognition to servers in Russia, and it does not work without an internet connection. It has no voice commands or voice editing: edits in an audit opinion are made with the keyboard. It also has no offline mode and no phone versions, so you cannot dictate a document away from a computer through it. If a company's internal policy forbids cloud processing of working papers, only the business option fits, with servers inside the company perimeter.

Frequently asked questions

Built-in dictation and Potok

Primary sources: support.microsoft.com · support.apple.com