Welcome to Legal Workflow Decoded

A warm welcome to Legal Workflow Decoded – it's been a while, hasn’t it? Apologies for our absence, which began with the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic and followed on through the subsequent economic recovery. We are keen to reconnect with you and have some exciting new developments to share. 

Practice Evolve Customised Workflows

Our customised workflows in Practice Evolve have helped the evolution of two firms in improving efficiency in their practice. We have been enjoying pushing the capabilities and boundaries of the software.

We work with various PMS products and if you have need to tailor yours to suit your firm, consult with us to see what options are available to enhance and optimise your practice.

FormEvo and Our New Software Integration 

We've had the pleasure of interacting with this innovative forms company over several years. Recently, we have developed an enhanced integration of their forms with a well-established practice management system and are preparing to do the same with another major PMS. 

Notwithstanding the name, FormEvo are primarily a data company, not a forms company.  They recognise that it is the data within the forms that is of real value, and the forms are mere receptacles.  This approach enables e-submission of forms for approval and signature and the export of data to third parties by way of, for example, SDLT submissions and the Land Registry Business Gateway.  Data can come back in too, from forms completed by clients into case management systems to alert lawyers to information that requires particular attention.  

We have long thought that forms will become obsolete and replaced by data exchanges, and FormEvo are at the forefront of this evolution, which, thinking about it, explains the name!

Our enhanced integration with FormEvo allows for more complexity and customisation based on firms' diverse needs. Leveraging our experience as a solicitor led company allows us to pinpoint and address prevalent challenges within legal practice. We have had a lot of positive feedback so far and aspire to continue developing integrations.

The Land Registry: A leading example for progress. 

It has been a pleasure to work with the Land Registry across several projects for the submission to and extraction from the Registry of Data, not only for law firms but for a large accountancy practice too. 

The Land Registry have led the way amongst organs of government in creating APIs to enable the movement of data. For those unfamiliar with tech terminology, an API is an Application Programming Interface. In simple terms it enables the transmission of data from one application to another and vice versa. 

If, as a firm you have been using case management systems (CMS) and in doing so creating vast amounts data, that data can pass through the Registry's API, communicate with the Registry and extract data. This data can be transferred back to your firm’s CMS and populates data fields thereby creating an automated process.

If only other such organisations would adopt a similar approach. It's all very well for the Probate Registry and Divorce Online to require electronic filing, but there is no sign of an API from them. Therefore firms cannot utilise CMS data and must enter data manually into these Registry portals. This situation is unacceptable, and we will continue to advocate the establishment of APIs wherever electronic submissions are required.

What do you think about the quantity and quality of API integration in the legal sector? Let us know your thoughts via our LinkedIn page where you can also find updates in the tech space.