Law Students

Using Internet Apps to Run, Manage, and Grow a High Volume Law Firm

By C. C.

Businesses have data to manage, documents to produce, and customers to invoice. Law firms are no different.

I run my own traffic defense law firm. It?s a high-volume practice area, which means I have lots of clients at any given time. There are lots of client contracts and invoices going out and coming back from clients.

In April, I wrote that I wanted to integrate my main systems. It?s done now, and this post explains everything.

What I Use

I use a number of separate systems. They all do their job very well.

• Remember the Milk (to do lists) ? API
• Google Calendar ? API
• BatchBook (contact management) ? API
• FreshBooks (invoicing) ? API
• MyFax
• EchoSign (electronic signatures) ? API

My Integrated System

The foundation of my system is BatchBook. It holds the basic client data for each case, such as:

• Name
• Contact info
• Traffic ticket data
• Legal fee info

Using that data, my program does a variety of things. It integrates all the above systems throughout a client?s case. Below are a few examples.

Client contract

Every client signs a contract to hire me. With three clicks, my system produces the default client contract as a PDF and sends it to the client for e-signing via EchoSign. With a couple extra clicks, I can customize the text of the client contract if necessary.

The coolest part of this feature is what else the system does when sending the client contract. It creates a to do list for the client in Remember the Milk (this includes the client?s trial date and other default tasks that I need to do for each case). It also adds the client?s court date to Google Calendar.

Invoice

After the client e-signs the contract, I can send an invoice through FreshBooks in two clicks. This step also updates the client?s task list in Remember the Milk (it marks the client?s contract complete and notes that the invoice has been sent).

Letter to court

When a client has hired me by signing the contract and paying the invoice, I notify the court that I represent them. Three clicks will send the default letter to the court via fax through MyFax. At the same time, the system also emails a copy of the letter to the client and marks this task off in Remember the Milk.

It currently takes a couple extra clicks to save the letter to the client?s digital folder, but I hope to automate that soon.

The Benefits

By now, it should be obvious that my integrated system saves time. It takes just a few clicks to process the regular paperwork, emails, and faxes for my law practice.

The system also improves accuracy. As long as the data is properly input into BatchBook, my program will produce accurate contracts, invoices, letters, etc.

Finally, my integrated system has enabled me to utilize a virtual assistant for many of these tasks. My assistant (who I highly recommend) inputs the client data into BatchBook and sends the contracts and invoices. I?m finding more and more ways for her to help with my work, which frees up my time to work directly with clients.

Any questions?

I?d be happy to answer any questions you have about integrating these systems. It takes some programming skill, but it isn?t that hard.

[thanks to mbowlersr and andrew flusche via cc]

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Full post as published by Law Vibe on September 29, 2009 (boomark / email).