Evictions, unpaid loans, contract breaches, injuries—just a few of the situations that comprise civil lawsuits today, where a conflict exists between a person and an institution or business, typically over money.
With 27,500 civil cases filed in the U.S. last year alone, the caseload for legal professionals isn’t slowing down. Civil cases are typically decided by a judge or jury and don’t result in charges or penalties, but rather money is awarded based on the severity of the case. Within each civil case, both parties present their side with supporting evidence, and a judge or jury makes a decision based on what is presented. But before that, legal professionals must develop, manage and track important documents and critical information through case management.
What is Case Management?
Case management is the proactive approach to managing legal cases, including all the steps involved from receiving a case to the final outcome. Case management helps reduce costs and better control litigation procedures, resulting in more predictability (and less stress) for parties. The case management process typically involves:
- Screening
- Assessing
- Evaluating risks
- Planning
- Implementing
- Following up
- Evaluating outcomes
Litigation can be difficult for many people because of the lack of effective communication, process inefficiencies and the extremely high costs associated with litigation in general. By applying systematic techniques in planning and employing centralized legal technology, professionals in law, insurance litigation, or government case management can streamline the process for more successful outcomes.
Benefits of Implementing Case Management Software for Legal Teams
Numerous advantages occur when investing in an online case management system, from developing workflows and automating common, repetitive tasks to improving communication with parties and better cost and expense tracking. More legal professionals are turning to case management software to better serve their legal organization and parties with the ability to:
- Store all of your valuable case information in a single place.
Every stage of the case management process produces data, resulting in a large repository of party and case information for your organization to manage on a daily basis. Keeping track of everything can be difficult, and housing valuable data in multiple locations can risk case organization, preparation, and outcomes. Law manager software centralizes your critical case data so case managers, agents, and other necessary parties can see the important information they need, when they need it—all from a single location.
- Keep data secure 24/7.
Party data is confidential, and it’s your organization’s job to ensure that nothing falls through the cracks. It’s important to select a private investigator case management software provider who has a proven track record of success and has passed the industry’s most stringent security standards. With multiple parties involved in each case, your case management system must have the ability to securely manage permissions—and tediously sending individual files over secure links won’t cut it. Case management software files can be shared directly via the software. Plus, everything is tracked, saved and shared in one place.
- Improve collaboration no matter where they are.
Keep your entire team in the know. When case files are centralized, everyone can view documents in real time, make updates, and even add notes, leading to greater collaboration—even if your team is remote. Whether they’re working at another office, a coffee shop, or at home, employees can access the same case files with just an internet connection and browser. That means 24/7 access to the assets they need, so work can be completed at any time. Plus, really good case management software is designed to allow non-technical users to administer and customize critical aspects of the application, including custom windows, document templates, Outlook integrations, custom prompts, and file menus so everyone can do their best work.
- Better analyze cases and make improvements.
Once a case has been resolved, a case management system allows you to go back and review documents, pull reports and analyze the results to further improve the process going forward. For business owners, the litigation management software can assist with uncovering unique relationships and trends between cases. This can lead to quickly solving cases in the future or better delivering compliance reports. Ultimately, legal organizations can see firsthand which cases are paying off and which aren’t—eliminating unproductive caseloads in the future.
- Improve standard legal processes through automation.
There are standard processes that need repeating for each and every case. Why not automate some of these critical processes to alleviate valuable time and resources? Case management software provides the ability to automate letters, forms, contracts and more. Automated workflows can be set for each stage in the process, ensuring that all tasks are completed at each phase. Emailed documents or other scanned items can then be seamlessly stored with each case. By reducing the amount of pen and paper required, you can rest assured that each document is there when you need it—automatically.
Case Management Has Never Been Easier or More Productive
Case management should be the easiest part of litigation. Case management software from Legal Files Software, Inc. enables legal professionals to prepare and collaborate more seamlessly and create healthier party relationships through greater efficiency and communication at each stage of the process.
With more than 30 years of experience supporting organizations across a number of industries, Legal Files Software, Inc. gives professionals the security, access and automation capabilities needed to focus on the bigger picture of resolving cases and making parties happy.
“When I came into this position a few years ago, we were entirely a paper office, organized with spreadsheets. Legal Files has been a game changer for us. This is going to have a significant effect on our operational efficiency. We already see how rapidly these benefits are materializing, and it’s only been a month.”
Christopher M. Palermo, Cayuga County Attorney
Cayuga County (New York), a Legal Files customer
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