uLaw's 4 top features according to Lena Legal Services
As a firm comprised of an equity & justice lawyer/consultant and a bookkeeper/assistant who is just learning about the processes of how legal billing operates according to the Law Society of Ontario, uLaw and their support team have been instrumental to our success.
N. Gitanjali Lena (LLB, LLM) founded Lena Legal Services (LLS) in 2019 after 10 years of practising at firms, legal clinics and working in not-for-profit social services. They bring their knowledge of human rights, employment, intellectual property and contracts law to public and private institutions and small organizations who want to increase equity and justice in their governance, human resources, programming, and workplaces. They have unique expertise in justice and equity practices for 2SLGBTQIA and disability communities.
The top four specific uLaw support features that have bolstered our success are trust and general account management, flexible invoicing, insightful financial reporting and outstanding customer support.
1. Efficient Trust and General Account Management
The ability to easily accept client payments and transfers while maintaining a clear distinction between trust funds and general operating funds is crucial for small law firms like LLS.
The support team has helped me understand how to accurately record general ledger and trust account transactions and view the automatic balance updates which makes it easy to see what our balances are. This has helped ensure proper invoicing and client payments, as well as it has helped with reconciling accounts.
2. Simplified Invoicing and Rate Management
It is very important to me that our clients receive detailed dockets and can easily see the work I have done.
The ability to generate thorough, accurate invoices and easily adjust hourly rates, and billing preferences has been very useful to us in giving our clients clear and professional statements. Also, for my bookkeeper, accurate record-keeping is crucial. The importance of tracking every transaction and securely backing them up ensuring we have proper documentation is so useful to us, not only did we sail through a LSO practice review and a spot audit, but also for having transparent, organized and accessible records for future reference. This record keeping feature in uLaw has helped us as all of our financial transactions are easily retrievable reducing administrative burdens, enhancing the firm’s efficiencies and ensuring LSO compliance.
3. Clear Financial Reporting
As a business owner it is important to me to have a firm understanding of our financial health.
uLaw offers a comprehensive view of LLS’s financials through their document generation feature.
This shows us detailed reports, such as balance sheets, profit and loss statements, revenue, and expense breakdowns. These reports have helped us track profitability, assess cash flow and identify revenue and efficiency trends over time.
4. Customer Support Service
Whenever we’ve encountered challenges, uLaw’s customer support has been exceptional. Whether it's a technical issue or a specific question about having particular items show up on an invoice, or for just understanding why we have a specific outstanding amount, the support team has consistently provided prompt and knowledgeable responses.
LLS serves a high percentage of 2SLGBTQIA clients and needs a legal software that operationalizes gender inclusivity. When we asked ulaw about changing automatic honorifics and pronouns in their forms and letter template they tried to accommodate us. We appreciate their efforts and look forward to gender-inclusive forms and templates.
My assistant started at LLS with limited knowledge of the legal billing world, the personal attention she has received from professionals who understand the unique needs of small law firms, has been invaluable. They have broken down processes into simple, easy-to-understand terms, making it much easier for her to grasp. Their willingness to help troubleshoot has played a key role in her learning. She is looking forward to her uLaw training calls with the uLaw support team as well as learning more about their new features such as virtual verification that can further enhance our practice.
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