May 9, 2011
Jury Fee at Motion to Enter?
By Clayton HasbrookDo I have to pay the jury fee at the time I file a motion to enter or can I pay it later?
Assuming you still prefer a jury trial, you’ll need to get it paid before the pre-trial conference. Take a look at 12 O.S. § 152.1(B). The case may settle between the date the motion to enter is filed and the pre-trial conference, so there’s no hurry to pay the $349 immediately.
April 30, 2011
Divorce Discourse: Excellent blog on Law Tech, Marketing, and Management
By Clayton Hasbrook
Image via CrunchBase
I’ve found myself reading Lee Rosen’s blog, Divorce Discourse, just about every day. It’s geared towards family law and divorce attorneys, but it really applies to attorneys of all practice areas.
I found his post on How to Work in Your Pajamas especially interesting. They are not only moving everything to the cloud, but shifting their office to a “distributed workforce” model. They’re getting rid of the traditional office space for attorneys.
The part about their case management software really caught my interest. They are using Salesforce and NetDocuments. Mind you, this is powerful software, but it isn’t made for law firms “out of the box.” I’m not aware of any other law firm out there that is doing this. We’re using Salesforce (and NetDocs) but it is customized by Advologix.
April 25, 2011
Oklahoma State Courts to go Paperless!
By Clayton Hasbrook
"Limitless Paper In a Paperless World" - The Office
I noticed in today’s paper that our state court system is going to get a new $30 million case management system overhaul. The goal is to have everything paperless by 5 years!
We can currently access a lot of the active case documents (but not always) through oscn.net. The upgrade will allow us to file everything electronically as well. The other added benefit is that the public will be able to access the court documents easier.
April 21, 2011
Advologix/NetDocuments Demo Video
By Clayton HasbrookHere’s a video I did on some of the basic features we’re using with Advologix and NetDocuments:
You’ll need to turn the volume up!
March 4, 2011
Everything will go to the cloud
By Clayton HasbrookThis week’s BusinessWeek cover story is The Cloud: Battle of the Tech Titans. I definitely think that everything will be going to the cloud. It’s not a matter of if, but when.
Some interesting notes:
- It’s estimated that Amazon will do about $750 million in business for it’s cloud storage (Amazon Word Services or AWS).
- “AWS makes t possible for anyone with an Internet connection and a credit card to access the same kind of world-class computing systems that Amazon uses to run its $34 billion a year retail operation.” Companies as big as Netflix use it.
My two cents: if it’s world class and secure enough for Amazon (and banks), it should work for small businesses.
Related articles
- The Cloud: Battle of the Tech Titans (businessweek.com)
- 74% Of SMBs To Increase Cloud Software Spend (informationweek.com)
- What Worries Netflix About Amazon Isn’t Just Competition (paidcontent.org)
- Google Offering More Cloud Storage – For a Price (thechromesource.com)
February 16, 2011
Document Management in the Cloud
By Clayton HasbrookI just received an email with a new NetDocuments (what we use) video:
Features I like:
- HIPAA Compliant
- Easy to mass upload and file new documents – and organize into a proper folder (correspondence, medical records, etc.).
- All the documents are accessible from one window – all within a client’s matter in Salesforce/Advologix (with all the parties involved, the calendar for that file, etc) – So I have everything about that file on one page
- It’s super quick
- I can access the files anywhere I have access to internet
- I can setup a client portal for a referring law firm to quickly send their files to my office. Email can be quick as well, but you’re limited by file size
- Editing documents is just like accessing them on a local server (no need to download/upload like most cloud apps)
February 8, 2011
Flat Stanley (from Elk Grove) Visits OKC
By Clayton HasbrookHere’s a few pictures from Flat Stanley’s visit to Oklahoma City:
Mr. Stanley was visiting on behalf of Jonathan Stein’s son for a school project. Jonathan is a personal injury attorney in Elk Grove.
February 1, 2011
Blizzard = no work, unless you’re “paperless”!
By Clayton Hasbrook
Image via Wikipedia
I left the office yesterday evening about 6:00 p.m. The gentleman I rode the elevator down with was haphazardly carrying three large files. He said something along the lines of: “I want to be able to get some work done tomorrow if the blizzard actually comes.”
One more benefit of scanning everything that comes into our office and having everything accessible from the cloud: I can work anytime, anywhere (assuming I have access to the internet access, of course).
January 14, 2011
Personal Injury Client Survey
By Clayton HasbrookWhether we like it or not, we’re in a customer service orientated business. A more exact phrase may be “client service” oriented business. Either way, attorneys can work really hard on a case, get a successful result, and the client may not be happy. A huge reason for this is lack of communication. We’ve been doing client surveys to get feedback from our clients. If we don’t think to ask, we probably won’t know what’s troubling our clients.
Here’s a Client Survey we give to clients. Obviously, it’s given with the instructions of “feel free to fill this out if you want, you certainly don’t have to.”
January 10, 2011
General Personal Injury Intake Form
By Clayton HasbrookHere’s a general personal injury intake form we use in our office. We actually rarely have the client fill it out because I’ve generally already asked for most of the info. It basically serves as a reminder of what we need to cover in our initial consultation.