Filevine

Opmerkingen: With Filevine's help, I've been able to increase three-fold the number of active cases I feel comfortable handling. It's a great product, with a great support team. I would highly recommend it to everyone, especially if you already have a billing program you like and don't want to change.

Pluspunten: This software adapts to the way you practice law. You don't organize your cases the way a vendor tells you to, you do it your way. You use your own, trusted, time-tested checklists and processes. But Filevine takes what you have built over your career to the next level by allowing you to streamline intake, and standard tasks you do in every case. The best way I can put is I don't need to cut-and-pate any more. I just click a button and I'm ready to serve standard sets of discovery. I don't need guess whether we ordered a court reporter for a deposition. There's a "Yes" or "No" button that says we did or didn't. I don't even need to manually check when we last did something on a case--I just click a button and a report tells me when the last activity occurred.

Minpunten: The set-up time is significant, especially if you are particular about the way things need to look and feel. But that's to be expected for something you can customize from the ground up. Outlook integration could be better, but it has improved since I've come on board. All signs indicate it's going to continue to get better.

Opmerkingen: ALTHOUGH THEY ARE VERY NICE, THEY DO NOT NEARLY HAVE ENOUGH STAFF. THEY ESPECIALLY DO NOT HAVE ENOUGH KNOWLEDGEABLE STAFF. IMPLEMENTATION WAS A STRUGGLE AND I HESITATE TO ASK FOR ANYTHING BECAUSE NOTHING HAPPENS. HOWEVER THE PROGRAM ITSELF HAS BEEN GREAT NOW THAT IT IS IMPLEMENTED (IT TOOK OVER 9 MONTHS FOR US TO GET UP AND RUNNING AND COST A LOT IN ADDITIONAL SOFTWARE AND OVERTIME FOR OUR STAFF).

Pluspunten: CUSTOMIZATION (A BIG ONE), REPORTING, EASE OF TRAINING/LEARNING FOR STAFF, KIND CUSTOMER SERVICE, SYNCING WITH OUTLOOK, DOCUMENT DRAFTING AND ORGANIZATION, STAFF PRODUCTIVITY MONITORING, DOCUMENT MERGING AND EASE OF CREATION OF TEMPLATES (ALTHOUGH MAKE SURE YOU UNDERSTAND IT FULLY BEFORE YOU BEGIN OR YOU WILL HAVE TO CREATE THEM OVER AND OVER).

Minpunten: CERTAIN THINGS DON'T MAKE SENSE AND CAN'T BE CHANGED. EX. NO SPOT FOR SUBRO LIENS IN THE DRAFT CLOSING TAB, SORTING OF REMINDERS IS OLDEST TO NEWEST AND YOU CANNOT FILTER FOR OPEN REMINDERS (SO YOU HAVE TO SCROLL FOREVER ON AN OLDER CASE TO GET TO THE OPEN REMINDERS), CAN ONLY ASSIGN ONE COST/TRUST ACCOUNT PER ORGANIZATION FOR SYNCING WITH QB (EVEN THOUGH IRS REQUIRES A SEPARATE ACCOUNT PER CLIENT FOR COSTS AND THE BAR REQUIRES A SEPARATE ACCOUNT PER CLIENT FOR TRUST). DO NOT SWITCH TO QB ONLINE SOLELY TO SYNC WITH FV. NOT WORTH IT AND YOU CANNOT SWITCH BACK. CHOOSE YOUR INTERNAL IMPLEMENTATION PERSON CAREFULLY. NEEDS TO BE SOMEONE THAT IS TECH SAVVY, FAMILIAR WITH YOUR PRACTICE AND HAS THE TIME TO DEDICATE 3 MONTHS MINIMUM TO ONLY THAT. GET THAT PERSON A TEMP ASSISTANT FOR 3 MONTHS. THEY'LL NEED IT. BECAUSE OF THE CUSTOMIZATION, THEY REALLY DO NOT LEAD YOU THROUGH IMPLEMENTATION. YOU DRIVE THAT TRAIN AND YOU ARE THE PROJECT MANAGER. DO NOT RELY ON THEM TO GUIDE YOU.

Opmerkingen: The PI department in my firm (my department) has used Filevine for about two years now. I think we were one of its first users. My firm also uses Clio. Clio has some real strengths in trust accounting and thinks like that. But Clio doesn't hold a candle to Filevine when it comes to communication. Filevine absolutely shines in the area of communication. That is an area where Clio and other practice managers fail. The Filevine Feed give unparalleled team cooperation and collaboration opportunities. Clio notes and tasks are combersome and my firm kind of ignores that feature. Filevine notes and tasks are the central feature of Filevine (imo) and it shows that the development team built it with team communication as the central goal. It is the only software that my office has ever used where I have been able to convince my staff to consistently take notes on what is happening in the case. I can think of at least four times in the last year where there was a dispute with the court, and insurance company, or a client about what we said or did. We pulled up Filevine, showed them our time-stamped notes and won the day. I also love, love, love the text-to-file feature. We can assign a private texting number to each client. The clients text directly into their case feed where I team can respond in text back. Clients can text pictures to that number, and Filevine will save them to the documents folder. If i am on the go, and I need to get a copy of a client's documents, I will often just take a picture of them and text them to the client's Filevine number. The texting feature means that texts aren't fragmented between different telephones. It means I can monitor communication between my team and my client. It means that we can reduce time-wasting phone calls by answering concise texts when we are ready. Clients really seem to love it. In all fairness, Filevine is still rough in a couple of areas. I have spoken with the developers, and I know that they are working around the clock to bring new functionality and to make existing functionality more elegant. I personally don't mind software that still has room to grow as long as it has a team that is excited about making it grow. I think Clio has that kind of a team too. I know that Filevine does. Anyway, it is worth taking a look at it. I know the Filevine team also spends a lot of time onboarding you with customization for your own firm. It is kind of cool.

Opmerkingen: While i do enjoy the ease of access to our files from any place in or out of office...there are some drawbacks to the setup of filevine. Ease of access is definitely there, however the fact that there is no ability to remove files once uploaded creates a problem. The interface changes monthly, with few functional updates. The inability to have more than one administrator to our projects also creates a problem, as we collaborate often between teams and need more than one person to have administrative abilities. The bottom line, i could care less how pretty it looks... i am more concerned with the functionality of a database and how well it supports team cohesion.

Opmerkingen: Great! On several occasions, I wanted or needed FV software to do certain things. So far, if the feature wasn't available, the FV team either created it or created something equivalent to meet our firm needs.

Pluspunten: I love that each project has a dedicated email address and phone #, so communications go directly into the file and allowing text communications with individuals without giving out a personal phone #.
I equally love that the FV team is always accessible and they are continually updating and creating new features.

Minpunten: The conversion from our old software to FV. That being said, our conversion troubles were not all FV issues. Having a person that knows the ins and outs of the old software and what features your firm used will help the FV team dramatically when it comes time to transferring data to appropriate fields.