Today's issue of TechnoLawyer NewsWire covers a legal billing and trust accounting system (see article below), a new lightweight laptop, a case and stand for iPad 2. Don't miss the next issue.
Manage Your Practice, Not Your Billing Software
For most of computer history, horizontal integration ruled the roost. IT consultants and managers preached purchasing best-of-breed products and then integrating them. However, in recent years lawyers began experiencing the benefits of vertical integration — two or more software products made by the same company working seamlessly together. Time has essentially turned the tables as software companies that lacked the resources to focus on more than one core function in their early days eventually developed the ability to expand into other areas. And nowhere do lawyers appreciate this integration more than in the two components that serve as the foundation of their law firms — billing and trust accounting on the one hand, and practice management on the other.
Amicus Premium Billing 2011 … in One Sentence
Gavel & Gown Software's new Amicus Premium Billing 2011 adds billing, collections, and trust accounting to Amicus Attorney Premium Edition 2011 practice management software.
The Killer Feature
Integration has three faces. As noted above, you can try to integrate products made by different companies. Alternatively, you can integrate products made by the same company. Amicus Premium Billing takes a third approach — it uses the same database as Amicus Attorney Premium Edition. Essentially, you simply turn it on via a license and it appears.
A single database eliminates the need to sync, and prevents problems such as duplicate entries. It's also more efficient. You never have to decide where you would prefer to enter data or enter data twice. Perhaps most importantly, a single database also means a single user interface. For any client and matter, you can toggle back and forth between the billing data and practice management data with one click.
"We are excited to offer lawyers a billing program designed for lawyers and not just bookkeepers," Gavel & Gown Software's President and Founder Ron Collins told us. "Amicus Attorney has always helped legal professionals capture more billable time. Now, with Amicus Premium Billing, we not only make it easy to catch that time, we make it easy to bill for it too in keeping with the Amicus way."
Other Notable Features
Amicus Premium Billing enables you to create bills that include both fees (contingency, fixed, hourly, etc.) and expenses. You can create bills from anywhere such as a client file or contact card. It also features trust accounting to ensure compliance with ethical rules when handling retainer fees, including interest tracking and warnings when disbursements exceed the available balance. Productivity reports help you evaluate your lawyers and other timekeepers. The Dailies dashboard enables you to quickly review the financial health of your law firm.
Billing is just half the game, review and collections comprise the other half. Billing Reminders, which you can set to display whenever you open Amicus Premium Billing, identifies various issues such as delinquent and unsent bills, and matters with too much work in progress. You can specify the thresholds for the various billing alerts (e.g., review bills within 10 days, send dunning notices 10 days past due, etc.). You can customize the look of your bills and subsequent notices using templates, and batch send both.
What Else Should You Know?
Like all of Gavel & Gown's software products, Amicus Premium Billing runs on Windows. It requires Amicus Attorney Premium Edition, and at your option integrates with QuickBooks for general ledger accounting. You can purchase an Amicus Premium Billing license alone or in conjunction with an annual maintenance or technical support plan. Learn more about Amicus Premium Billing 2011.
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So many products, so little time. In each issue of TechnoLawyer NewsWire, you'll learn about five new products for the legal profession. Pressed for time? The "In One Sentence" section describes each product in one sentence, and the "Killer Feature" section describes each product's most compelling feature. The TechnoLawyer NewsWire newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.
