ABS diary | Taking the IT step

We're a three-partner firm and became an ABS in the very first round of SRA licences, together with the Co-op and a sole practitioner. I found myself alongside the Co-op again last week, when their IT director and I were speakers at the Alternative Legal IT Conference. Our brief was to consider how technology supports the business role of an ABS.

Firms like mine need technology for support not because we are an ABS but because organisations like the Co-op will present competition to high street practices. The difference between us is that while larger organisations rely on technology to drive them forward we can use technology to complement our tried and tested business model.

John Welch and Stammers was established in 1932; we are a high street practice with 18 employees. I have been with the firm for 18 years and the practice manager '“ now managing partner '“ for the last 13 years. I am not a solicitor and the sole reason for converting to ABS was so I could join the partnership. We have no intention to change its business model at all.

Over the past 75 years the partners and times have obviously changed, but our reputation, professionalism and ethos has not changed.

For instance, we decided several years ago not to open a branch office on the basis that the firm wanted to remain small enough to retain the personal touch and provide an efficient legal service at a reasonable price while incorporating the modern technology. The majority of our clients come to us for this very reason: they like small, they like to see what they are paying for and they like fee-earner and staff interaction.

IT has its place and is fundamental to the day to day running of any law firm. It is vital for efficient communication, client database, risk management, conflicts, money laundering, reporting, bottom line and cash flow management.

However, being practice manager I have the task of weighing up the pros and cons of any expense, taking into account our bottom line and the long term effects any major investment may have on our firm.

This has been even more of a consideration over the past three years with the recession and fall in interest rates, and the knock on effect this has had, particularly in conveyancing.

We have survived the recession for the ?following reasons:-

? We are a strong team and we pull together. For instance, I am the IT department, the HR department, the COFA¸ the accountant. I overview and fee earn in the probate department, and I buy the milk and change the light bulbs.

? Our support staff know their and each other's jobs inside out. We all multi task.

? All our solicitors and non-solicitor fee earners are experienced, work very hard running extremely busy departments, each department having a wide range of clients with very different needs.

? We have loyal and long standing staff. The office is a good environment to work in and we all know each other well. As employers we are flexible.

? We have a strong client base. All our trade is word of mouth. We do minimal and only local marketing. We offer free initial interviews and offer a lot of our work on a fixed-fee basis. For us, the supply of legal services should not be process driven. We hope we operate as efficiently as possible but our ethos is all about expertise and client service, which means providing the service our clients want, need and expect.

Technology v client care

We have had to cut back our bottom line expenses, which we have managed until now, but with no major investment for the past few years the one area in our firm that is becoming more cumbersome is IT. We have always had IT, investing in good quality hardware software and support, however, we do not have some of the bells and whistles such as IT-based time recording or case management.

In this age of diversity, red tape, rules, regulations and risk, you have to be careful to strike an even balance between client care, risk management and efficiency.

Whether you are a national organisation like the Co-op or a small high street practice like us, to sustain any legal practice you must be efficient, but efficiency must not compromise client care and client care must not compromise efficiency.

For this reason we are about to invest heavily in our IT. In fact we are going to move from one extreme to the other as we are considering venturing into the cloud and roll out other IT tools '“ but we want to do this carefully and limit these to what we need to sustain our business model efficiently.