Nearly unlimited continuation pages can be "attached" to the Affidavits, and the organization and subtotaling of their information is all handled automatically.
Once Is Enough. All this information automatically transfers to the appropriate fields. UDRF completed the complaint in its entirety! From the standpoint of the user, there was nothing to do except review the completed form.
With the web forms, all this information must be entered manually. And again in the Separation Agreement. And again in the Judgment Entry. What a classic waste of time! UDRF completes nearly 1, fields based on your worksheet entries.
Save Everything In One File. That means your client information is scattered in a dozen different files. Easy to make mistakes. Easy to lose information. Make Changes A Better Way.
Integrated accounting capabilities help prevent data re-entry, minimize errors, avoid penalties or lost business resulting from a lack of compliance, and establish other financial management efficiencies. Legal firms often have the unique, additional requirement of handling trust accounting. Strong cash management and bank reconciliation capabilities are a must when managing investments across a client portfolio.
Assigning which funds can be dispersed, cutting checks, and maintaining proper records are functions supplied by trust accounting software. Generally, basic bookkeeping and more industry neutral accounting packages do not offer the features required for efficient management of trust accounting. Legal time and billing programs offer the ability to both enter and track hours in real-time, as well as create after the fact time entries, for the purpose of billing.
Your main product, as a legal firm, is the time and expertise of your attorneys. A capable time and billing program is, therefore, one of the most important information systems for any law firm. Whether you are billing on hourly rates or flat-fees, time and billing software is designed to flexibly meet your time tracking and billing needs.
The ease of which attorneys can track time has a direct relationship with the accuracy of the resulting billing statements. Tedious time-tracking approaches majorly inhibit the ability to accurately track and bill time. The market is rife with companies offering time and billing solutions, though. This competition works to your advantage. Software providers have been continually refining their ability to offer lightweight, accessible, and intuitive time and billing software choices.
Do you require a fully integrated legal software solution? As noted, practice management, legal accounting, and time and billing software can be found as standalone solutions. This sort of standalone approach can be very attractive.
Companies often gravitate toward standalone options in order to leverage existing investments by adding components. Standalone programs may offer more out of the box specialization and the ability to more closely target unique needs. On the other side of the coin, there are many full systems that offer a complete, integrated approach. This type of approach can decrease ongoing support costs related to maintaining integration.
Complete systems also promote efficiencies related to decreasing the duplication of data that might occur when maintaining multiple systems. Also, a consistent GUI is simpler and quicker to learn. The fact is, there are few industries where the minute-by-minute time spent by users learning software represents as significant of a lost earning opportunity as with law firms. Another important consideration for legal firms is access to support and services.
Implementing a new software program is a major decision not only because of the monetary cost, but the potential impact on time. Data conversion - that is, bringing in your existing data to a new system - is particularly intense for law firms because of the data-centric nature of the business.
Additionally, there is a learning curve with new systems. QuickBooks advertises itself as being a viable option for your legal accounting needs. This includes accounting, billing, and reporting. There are plenty of resellers of QuickBooks who have experience implementing the solution into law firms, many of whom may have their own custom developed add-ons for QuickBooks that make the software easier to manage or simply provide workarounds where QuickBooks may fall short.
More industry-specific legal accounting software will likely have a way to create separate files for cases and clients and allow an easier way to flow about your program, review detailed figures such as expenses incurred for this case for this client in this month , and more. In my experience, communication improved, and as a result there was a positive focus on the children.
The feedback I received from attorneys and litigants was encouraging. Everyone involved in these cases felt that Our Family Wizard was a benefit in placing the emphasis on the children rather than the animosity between the parents. Family Law Software easily handles all of the financial issues in a divorce case. It not only computes guideline child support in my state and 20 others plus all of Canada , but it also allows me to see alimony and property division options to create complete settlement scenarios and variations.
The built-in ability to generate Financial Disclosure statements for the Court with one click is a bonus. We start every case with entry of the financial data from the client — which the clients can directly enter for themselves easily and securely. Once the data is entered, you have the ability to see the entire financial picture of the marital and non-marital estates, cash flow, and even projections of net income and net worth up to 50 years out.
I use Family Law Software in every family law case involving a financial issue that comes in to my office. I researched and tested a number of cloud-based practice-management programs, and chose MyCase because it offers a robust set of features that save my practice time and money. Affordable and powerful, the software helps me manage all aspects of my law practice, including contacts, calendars, cases, documents, time tracking, and billing.
It also allows all members of my team — whether in the office or working remotely — to access the digital file at any time. I am capturing so much more of my billable time that MyCase is nearly paying for itself every month. As a solo practitioner shouldering a fast-paced domestic practice, I consider MyCase to be my secret weapon: it allows me to focus on serving my clients rather than worrying about case management and billing issues.
This is significant because until such apps existed, most preparation had to be done by clients telling their story directly to the attorney or paralegal, and printing out pictures or evidence. Day One allows your client to create a chronological timeline of activity, with pictures and descriptions; the file is password-protected, can sync with iCloud or DropBox, and the client can email an entry with photo or the entire timeline in PDF format to you or anyone in your office.
The client simply snaps a photo of event, screenshot of text conversation, or other , and then adds a description to that photo. The program allows you, your client, or paralegal to have virtual access to a time-based series of events to better understand or convey the situation to a mediator or judge, if necessary. It then flows automatically to federal, state, and county forms for estate, guardianship, adoption, domestic relations, real estate conveyance, or tax filings.
For those with Internet access, this is done by clicking the Update button within the program. Otherwise an update CD will be sent to you. None of your information will be lost even after your free license expires.
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