Home Office Lawyer

Options for Practicing with a Virtual Office

Virtual Law Office Technology, LLC has two post up today about using the Internet with your law practice.

The first one is Elawyering Resources and it provides a great list of links you can use to find out more about a virtual practice.

The second one is Who is practicing law online? The list looks like this. You need to check it out too to see if you might fit in one of those categories.

1. Solo and small firm practitioners wanting to practice law online to lower business overhead and expand their client base across the state to compete with larger firms,

2. Existing traditional law firms wanting to add online clients, lower overhead and provide more cost-effective services and online amenities to existing clients,

3. Online attorney collaboration both in-state and across jurisdictions allowing smaller firms or solo practitioners to pool business and networking resources,

4. Attorneys wanting to set up home-based or remote online law offices,

5. Legal professionals, such as paralegals, legal assistants or virtual assistants, wanting to work online for an existing law practice, and

6. Attorneys wanting to work part-time, such as retiring attorneys, work-at-home parents, or legal professionals needing to take time away from the office to care for children, ill spouses or aging parents.

Visit Virtual Law Office Technology, LLC and find out more about their product and how it could work with your law practice.

Introducing a New Web Based Case Management for Solo and Small Law Firms

Like many of you, I have been frustrated with the lack of law office specific case management software for the solo and small law firm. Oh, sure there is software out there. And some of it is great. And you have to mortgage the house and first born to afford it. Now there is an alternative. And let me tell you this. I have tried this new legal software and it is quite wonderful.

Most solos and small firms have embraced the use of web based technology the last few years. By taking advantage of this trend, Rocket Matter has developed a web-based practice management software. It is accessible from anywhere with Internet access. You can use it on a Mac, PC, iPhone, or even a Linux machine. You can log on and bill time from the office, home, or on the road.

The crew at Rocket Matter designed it to be as simple to use as possible. Your calendar, contact manager, matter manager, and time and billing software is rolled into one integrated, enjoyable product. You can generate invoices for all your billable matters with a single click of the mouse.

Their "Bill as you Work"™ technology captures your billable time as you go about your day. There is no need to total up hours at the end of the billing cycle or to figure out where your time went.

Getting started is easy. You don’t have to buy servers. You don’t have to pay someone to install Rocket Matter. You don’t even have to buy licenses. You only pay for the number of users you want, and that’s it. Best of all, you can save the likely $8000 you’d have to pay for a traditional practice management setup.

With Rocket Matter, you can sleep well, knowing you have daily backups and security managed for you automatically. And since Rocket Matter's servers are in a redundant, premier data center, you have an instant disaster-recovery plan.

I encourage all of you to explore this great new product further. Sign up for an exclusive invitation and view a preview of the product at RocketMatter. Subscribe to their Product Updates to follow Rocket Matter developments.

Death By Email Blog: Senate OKs 7 Years of No Email Tax

Good news from the Futurelawyer.

Roger Matus reports today that the Senate has passed a bill delaying any taxation of the Internet and email for 7 years. Email has become a preferred method of communication for many lawyers and clients; it avoids the stamp tax of the Postal Service. Of course, email has many disadvantages; not the least of which is the ephemeral, find me if you can, nature of electronic communication. The feeling of informality in email communication has lured more than one communicator into an embarrassing or legally risky error. I suspect that the first Egyptian Pharaoh who put pen to paper immediately sensed the permanency provided by such communication. However, I don't think the Pharaoh had the problem of hordes of hungry lawyers seeking discovery of his scrolls.

My own postage expense is less than half of what it use to be. I use email to exchange documents with my clients and opposing counsel on most cases. In fact, if my clients have a computer and an email account, I require them to use it to communicate with me. Best of all, there is that paper trail.

Home Office Warrior was down for a time today

Home Office Warrior was done for a time today due to a mess up with my account at Hostgator. It seems they stopped invoicing my account in May so nothing was being paid out of my paypal account.

Why am I telling you this? For the simple fact that Hostgator was on the problem as soon as I contacted them. What was really cool is that I was able to do a live chat with the support person and we were able to resolve it quickly. I have come to realize that “stuff” happens in the world of working on the Web. However, when you can work with companies like Hostgator who are so responsive to customer problems, it is not quite so bad.

Thank you Hostgator!!!!

Wake up Courthouses and come into the 21st century

The Indiana Family Law Blog had a post today that reminds me not all of us live and work in areas where courthouses are actually accepting the fact technology is here to stay. In the post called, Courthouse Technology Issues we get a picture of courthouses that want to limit the ability of lawyers to use the technology available to them to better serve their clients.

The excuse we hear to justify this is that they don't want cameras in the courtroom. Easy solution, have it so only lawyers can bring their Smartphones, cell phones and PDA’s into the courtroom. Like many lawyers, I don't carry a paper calendar. I very seldom carry paper files. I carry two great tools to court. My MacBook and my iPhone. Both have my calendar on them. Oh, and by the way, they both have the ability to take pictures in court.

Come on courts who won't allow attorneys to carry such tools into court, get over yourselves. How many attorneys are going to sit in court and take pictures of the judge or worse witnesses? We use such tools for a reason. Most of us use it to be more efficient in our practices and allow us to better serve our clients. Heck, if I am waiting for a hearing, as we all do, I can check my email on my iPhone and answer those emails. This allows me to use technology so I am not wasting my time and worse my clients time and money waiting in court for a hearing. Usually waiting because some attorney is trying to find something in his/her paper file or paper calendar.

Jawbone : The Best Bluetooth Headset

Finis Price of TechnoEsq has a review today of The Best Bluetooth Headset, the Jawbone. And I could not agree more.

I have used and tried at least 4 other BT headsets, and this one is by far the best one I have used. It works great with my iPhone too. I would recommend you visit Finis’ review and also take a look at the demo he suggest. And he is right, the demo is not exaggerating anything. This thing is just wonderful.

Courtroom Technology or the Lack of it

In my local courtroom today for a couple of hearings. Once again using my iPhone to do this post. While watching the proceedings and observing the other attorneys, I am amazed at the lack of attorneys using anything other than paper.

Paper calenders, paper files and no PDA's or computers. I was having a conversation with one attorney about how I do things. He was amazed that I get my dictation done by someone I never see. He was also telling me how he was trying to train the staff to scan everything that comes into his office.

Are attorneys in general afraid of tech or just afraid of change?

Multi-touch driven computer screen

Could this be some of the influence the iPhone will have on the computer industry? This video is about four minutes long. You can see what the potential is in the first few seconds. This is just crazy.

The Trial Technologist’s View

The Trial Technologist’s View is a very interesting blog from the view point of someone who actually works in the courtroom. Blake Boyd provides an insiders view of our trial system and gives us some great tools to use along the way. I look forward to following this blog.

Connected Lawyer - Communication Policy and Vacation

I wish I had read “the world’s greatest balancing act: creating a vacation communication policy” before I went on vacation.

More to follow!!