Watson Burton A case study in using LawSoft and working with Pilgrim

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1 Watson Burton A case study in using LawSoft and working with Pilgrim FIRM DETAILS Firm name Watson Burton LLP Firm representative interviewed for case study Firm background/history Jonathan Smith, IT Manager Watson Burton LLP is a leading law firm with almost 200 years experience in providing the full range of commercial law services to an established national client base. Employing over 300 people and with offices in Newcastle, Leeds and London, the firm has significant nationwide coverage providing first class legal advice. Firm specialisms Full service commercial, public sector and private individuals How long has the firm been a Pilgrim client? Since January 2005 OVERVIEW OF PILGRIM PRODUCTS UTILISED BY CLIENT Products utilised We use the full spectrum of LawSoft including the extranet add on module which is called LawSoft Xtra. We are currently rolling out the Document Management module. Why was the product required? Previous supplier (if applicable) The firm was previously using a DOS version of Linetime which had not been migrated to a Windows based system. The system was purely for accounts. All time recording was done manually on paper with Finance having to key it all in. The firm was growing rapidly and needed to implement full practice management facilities across the firm. See above Why did you choose LawSoft by Pilgrim? During a lengthy selection process the shortlist was narrowed down to two products which were LawSoft and the Elite Enterprise. LawSoft was one of the few products with an intuitive web interface. This was a key factor in choosing LawSoft at the firm I worked with previously to Watson Burton. The LawSoft product was just that little bit different and acting on the assumption that all lawyers were likely to have used a website before, they d be able to use the LawSoft interface.

2 The other key factor was the rich feature set with everything in one integrated product. LawSoft was not the leading product for Document Management at the time but when you go from an accounts only system to PMS firm wide, expectations of core components are low and most people are unaware of what was possible. The idea was to initially put something in place for Document Management and Case Management and generate interest in these functions across the firm. As each new version of LawSoft has evolved, these products have evolved and functions such as document and case management can now stand toe to toe with products historically known as the market leader. Overall, the whole integrated package with an easy to use web based interface made it quite an easy choice for our firm. What did Pilgrim offer that other suppliers did not e.g. unique features of LawSoft? Any other comments? The web interface. Our internal processes previously were very manual. Our reporting was on a monthly basis with no real time information or regular snapshots available the production of reporting was a laboured process and relied upon key staff for its generation. LawSoft hugely streamlined and improved this. Before moving to LawSoft, time recording was a manual paper based process which created frequent backlogs. The first thing we noticed following the implementation of LawSoft was the speed at which our fee earners took to electronic time recording. Within the first fortnight of going live we had around 99% of fee earners live and electronically time recording. OUTCOMES What benefits has your firm experienced since the implementation of LawSoft? Access to information straight to the fee earners desktops. We spent quite a lot of time tailoring reports, particularly performance and fee earners performance reports, to enable people to drill down to specific information quickly. We also produce reports on clients, for example our top 200 clients and additional business development reporting. We started off doing small amounts of workflow for file opening, with the immediate benefit being that the process was standardised across the firm and cut out the significant delays experienced previously when opening a file and getting time recorded on it. This really streamlined and improved our whole matter creation process with huge time saving benefits. We ve subsequently carried out a few more Case Management

3 projects in LawSoft, which have added huge time benefits in terms of the cases we can turn over. We ve just completed one for a large client that s gone down particularly well which they now access remotely via the LawSoft extranet facility, LawSoft Xtra. This solution is now used as a template to be able to offer a real benefit to our clients that often our competitors can t match. Having workflow and extranet access in place enables us to be more flexible and innovative with commercial terms for clients. Clients are looking to cut costs in these hard times and through being able to do the work in a more streamlined fashion through the Case Management tool we have been able to accommodate them. We are also able to publish information on the extranet which the client can access 24/7. Time recording has hugely improved following the implementation of LawSoft which immediately removed the burden of input. As a direct result of the implementation of electronic time recording the amount of time captured has also significantly increased particularly where time clocks are used. Does your staff find LawSoft easy to use? In short Yes. LawSoft was very well received by the firm when it was implemented. We now have two internal trainers who are very experienced in LawSoft and a combination of classroom and drop in sessions as well as good quality handouts helped things to go smoothly. As mentioned before electronic time recording was adopted by practically all of our fee earners within two weeks. We also decided in advance on some rules and guidelines for using LawSoft which greatly assisted with the implementation and maintains consistency across the firm. Key savings e.g. cost, time, manual effort Our Debt Collection work moved immediately to LawSoft Workflow on implementation and we now have one person managing a workload which previously required 3 staff. The streamlining and standardisation brought by LawSoft has brought benefits in both time and cost. LawSoft has generally changed the way our people work for the better. The ease of the LawSoft implementation and the benefits it has brought has made our people less resistant to change and open to new technology innovations, for example the implementation of digital dictation. PILGRIM SERVICE AND SUPPORT: How would you generally describe your relationship with Pilgrim? Excellent.

4 What do you think of the Pilgrim staff you have met? Pilgrim has grown and there are lots of new faces however what Pilgrim has managed to retain is the family feel. Many staff have worked for the company for a long time and know the product inside out. Even though a number of new faces have been brought in, each of them have brought something new which has only helped the product to evolve and improve. As much as there is this family feel to the organisation, you can be confident that Pilgrim is an evolving company that is always looking at current technology. Pilgrim frequently looks hard at the product and is constantly searching for ways to both improve the product and deliver real benefits. Has Pilgrim ever gone above and beyond in terms of its service to you? At Pilgrim there is always someone on hand to talk to and I know we ll get extra support if we need it. Pilgrim has been and remains very open to us suggesting new functionality and discussing development possibilities. There have been countless occasions where we ve received a very fast and very high level of support from staff who are willing to go above and beyond. What is your opinion of the Support Service? The support team are very good. Unlike other suppliers and products which we deal with there are very few issues which drag on. Our calls are dealt with quickly and we have a good relationship with many members of the support team. Having the ability to call the support team to discuss an idea or check why something behaves the way it does has been invaluable. Any other comments on Pilgrim s service and support? I think a more formal system for development requests and suggestions would be helpful. Logging ideas for enhancements which could then be discussed with the development team with feedback on likelihood of it progressing to development and also timescales attached. There is a process in place at the moment but feel it could work better without a lot of change involved. One idea would be a regular forum for key Clients with members of the PSG team, maybe bi monthly. Overall, our feeling on the service and support is very positive and we feel we receive an excellent level of service from the team. Lindsay in particular does a lot of good work for us especially when it comes to getting to the bottom of an issue. Lindsay s way is very proactive when the pressure is on you

5 do not want to waste time going through long lists of standard questions BT style which you know are not going to move the issue forward. You can have an open and productive conversation. We are generally very happy with both Pilgrim as a company and LawSoft as a product! We ll invest whatever time we can to help improve LawSoft. We take the latest version of the product as soon as we can as we can see the benefits and want to be seen by Pilgrim as one of their better clients. We are keen to really be using everything fully, testing it and giving our feedback and aim to become an IPR site in the not too distant future. We have been more than happy to do reference calls and visits or help with case studies, and are happy to see a constant stream of other firms moving to LawSoft.