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| Lawyer's Helper, Version 4.2 | Case Management |
 As firms of
all sizes become increasingly computer dependent, if not literate, the need for an
affordable – and easily learned – case-management system has become an even
higher priority. Until recently, most small firms who could neither afford large
customized systems and consultant training, nor devote extensive time to learning database
management, have been relegated to using non-legal personal information managers to
satisfy their calendaring and contact-management needs.Some have ventured out into the worlds of Abacus, Amicus and Time Matters, with mixed results. Lawyers who were more comfortable with computers had an easier time adjusting to these programs, while less digitally sophisticated attorneys were intimidated by the learning curve inherent in the efforts of these programs to do everything but wash the firm’s digital dishes. Lawyer’s Helper is a program that tries to
simplify the case-management process and, as an entry-level management program, largely
succeeds. Lawyer’s Helper, which has the interesting feature of being available in a browser-based format, as well as in its own format, offers all the basics that a solo or small firm needs. Divided into coordinated modules, the program offers calendaring, contact management, simple document management and merge functions, as well as time and billing and simple e-mail and marketing capabilities. Starting the program, any open alerts or imminent appointments with alarms will flash to the user, before the main screen even loads, making sure that important items don’t get lost among a lawyer’s long list of daily commitments. Once inside, the user is presented with the Home screen that lists appointments and tasks due for the day, as well as a list box from which contacts, their addresses and phone numbers can be accessed quickly by a just a right click on the mouse. If you use a MAPI compliant e-mail program, such as Outlook or others, the Home screen will tell you how many e-mail messages you have, although, it does not allow viewing of them from within Lawyer’s Helper. Once configured, the Home screen also reminds a user of things, including how long it’s been since a new matter was opened, how long since the last marketing effort, how efficient your billing and collections have been in recent weeks and other information most attorneys will find useful. More in-depth information about any of this information is accessed by clicking on icons that open up the program’s individual modules, divided into the Planner, Contact, Marketing, Documents and Billing categories. The Planner module allows simple entry of appointments and tasks and allows alarms to avoid overlooking outstanding commitments. Like other modules in the program, the Lawyer’s Helper Planner section allows commitments to be cross-referenced with contacts and matters related to the scheduled appointment and task. Once entered, the cross-referenced information will show up in other modules where relevant. Thus, court appearances relating to a particular opposing attorney or matter will show up as a listing in the Contact screen for that attorney or the case screen for the matter. The other useful feature of the Planner module is the ability to create timetables for future events, all flowing from a pre-set baseline. In this way, a series of steps for multi-step processes can be established and used over and over again. The Contact module also provides most of the basics one would need. Beyond providing plenty of room for multiple telephone numbers and addresses, clicking on the button next to the telephone number or e-mail entry will, alternately, dial the phone number through any line connected to the computer or call up your e-mail program and open a new message. Besides these features, there are plenty of user-customizable fields, including user-defined pick lists, which can be created for easy entry of whatever commonly used information a lawyer or firm likes to store. Equally useful, once a contact’s main screen is called up, Lawyer’s Helper allows you to merge with template, which you create from your own internal forms. As one would expect, the Matter module includes fields for basic matter information, including cross-references to identified clients, as well as an area in which to create your own matter plan for easy review and reference. Like other case-management programs, the module also contains a tab for lists of related documents and contacts that the user can enter. The Billing module provides all that is needed for basic time and expense input, billing and reporting, with easy time entry that is accessible by mouse clicks. The Documents module isn’t really a module, but rather, a tab that calls up your word processor and inserts a Lawyer’s Helper menu selection in the toolbar to facilitate common merge functions, such as addressing letters, envelopes and labels; it also assists in creating your own merge documents using fields of your own choice. Another nice feature is the “flagging” feature that lets a user flag several merge contacts or documents over the course of a day and print them all at once, whenever desired, avoiding repetitive trips to the network printer. The Marketing module shows many commonly used reports, which, again, incorporate fields that either come out of the box or that the user can create. These reports can help you remember which type of clients should receive what kind of mailing, help you identify demographic patterns among clients and so on. While the program aims to be as self-contained as possible, there are a few unavoidable links to outside products, which were included because of popularity and the lack of a home-grown internal capability. For example, Lawyer’s Helper includes the same rudimentary link to the Palm Pilot as contained in its competitors’ case-management programs. Similarly, it links to QuickBooks for payables and receivables functionality. That, however, is where the third-party linking pretty much ends; Lawyer’s Helper claims to deliberately avoid links to programs, relying, instead, on its own versions, to create a self-sufficient solution. For those who insist on using third-party programs, Lawyer’s Helper does afford some flexibility by allowing customers to customize and dispense with purchasing some components that they won’t use. In a way, this approach helps beginners who don’t have these other programs and who may never need them, while allowing those that do the freedom to continue to use them without paying for duplication. This savings, however, comes at a price of lessened integration. Overall, integration is one of the program’s weak “links.” While there is frequent cross-referencing between modules, allowing simple document merges and the listing of entries from one module within another, there are many expected information integration tasks that the program doesn’t perform. Another shortcoming is in the database’s field ordering, or lack of it. For those that are keyboard centric, many programs allow data entry by tabbing from field to field. Lawyer’s Helper’s fields, however, are often not sequentially ordered so that tabbing from one field to another on a screen is rather like watching a Mexican jumping bean instead of an orderly progression from the first to last field. This makes extensive use of the mouse a program requirement. In the end, the strength and weakness of Lawyer’s Helper is that it is a basic level case-management program with enough features to meet the needs of smaller firms that do not, or cannot, master a number of more sophisticated feature sets of some of its competitors. |
North American Software Inc. (513) 793-2240 www.nasoftware.com Windows 95/98/NT 4.0, Pentium 100 or higher, 16 MB of RAM or more $445 (full version - $96/ year for support) or $245 (each subset - $60/ year for support) Reviewed by Jay Holander, attorney, New York, NY PROS CONS VERDICT |
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