Legal Precedent creation software

I recently spoke with Dave Humphreys from CompuWork Pacific Inc. regarding software they developed for a Vancouver BC Law Firm.  One of his client's realized what a pain it was for his staff to manually create and fill out new legal precedent documents for every file he was working on. So he created a set of precedent templates akin to merge documents. He then commissioned CompuWork to create a Database Management System to store his data and populate any of these documents on demand. He currently has a library of close to 1000 precedents.

"It is not an off-the-shelf product" Dave explained. "This system was custom-made to spec, but all of the functionality and methods could be adapted into a new custom package, should any legal office be interested. It's primary purpose is to populate legal precedent documents with valid data, although it's abilities have been extended quite a bit over time."

 

 The benefits that give his customer a competitive advantage include:

• fewer errors as all data resides in one system and is validated when input or modified
• staff are restricted to lists of values in many cases, eliminating the typos etc that come with entering data as free-form text
• huge savings in time and staff costs as data can be entered once, extracted many times
• easy to use, intuitive system requires little training - most paralegals are up and running within a day

Major features include (and more added every year)

• ability to sort and filter file data in tabular format
• statistical reports
• bring-forward tasks and diary for all staff
• generation of custom reports to clients in Word or Excel
• email creation and logging, with comments
• ability to print formatted file labels, envelopes, pdf documents
• data is used by the firm to provide reports to their clients on the Web
• ability to search and replace data in all precedents at once
• ability to "clone" similar precedents, eliminating the need to create documents from scratch
• ability to create document packages containing multiple precedents
• auto lookup of postal code info, based on street address and city, via web service

The caveat Dave's client offers is that the lawyer or firm must be willing to create the precedents. CompuWork can provide a how-to guide, but it does take some time to set up. Dave suggested that the best strategy is to start with that 10% of your documents that you use 75% of the time, then add or copy more precedents as time allows.

 

For any Law Firm with an interest, Dave has offered to demo the system.

 

Dave Humphreys

CompuWork Pacific Inc.

Phone (604) 684-8211  Fax (604) 684-8210

http://www.CompuWork.net

 

And if you are looking for an easy way to lower your I.T. support costs while practically eliminating computer problems, glitches, and downtime, then give us a call.  Or visit us at www.ComputerSupportForLawFirms.com.

 

Chris Miles

Insight Information Technology (or Insight I.T. for short)

 

P.S.  The last bulleted point, the postal code lookup, is another service CompuWork provides - near instantaneous population of postal codes via a web service. They use the current Canada Post database. This is a subscription service that can be used stand-alone or it can be integrated into existing software systems. www.postalcodeservices.net

 

 

 

 

Chris Miles
Insight Information Technology
cmiles@insightit.ca
604-484-4218 Direct

604-484-5141 Lower Mainland
604-864-0465 Abbotsford
604-357-1471 Fax

"Let Us Manage IT"
  www.InsightIT.ca

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