The New AML Rules – Can Proclaim Assist?

Money laundering is a crime which puts law firms at high risk of becoming a target due to their credibility. It is not a victimless crime as it is usually responsible for the funding of other crimes including drug trafficking and the financing of terrorism. The UK anti money laundering (AML) rules are in place to prevent money laundering within all businesses.

There have been some major changes to UK anti money laundering (AML) rules which came into effect on 10th January 2020 with the introduction of The Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing (Amendment) Regulations 2019. These regulations provide an update to the Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing and Transfer of Funds (Information on the Payer) Regulations 2017 (MLR 2017).

The new AML regulations provide strict rules and guidelines which all financial institutions and businesses should adhere to in order to prevent financial crime. The prevention of money laundering and counter terrorism are now a top priority for law enforcement so the new AML rules should be of utmost importance to all businesses at risk of being used for money laundering and terrorist financing.

How can Law Firms Ensure Compliance with the New AML Rules?

The SRA has recently targeted hundreds of law firms and more than 40 solicitors were struck off or suspended in the last five years for failing to have adequate anti-laundering checks in place. As the AML rules impose strict sanctions for businesses who do not comply with The Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing (Amendment) Regulations 2019, it is within the interest of everyone that all Solicitors introduce or update existing policies for identifying, monitoring and reporting suspicions of money laundering.

There are many ways in which a law firm can ensure that they comply with the new AML rules. It is a legal requirement for solicitors to carry out risk assessments to avoid the risk of money laundering when dealing with clients.

It is essential that all law firms have a vetting process in place to check for money laundering risks when taking on new clients. Any high risks or warning signs should be reported to am manager or the appropriate person within the business.

The AML rules require that a  Money Laundering Reporting Officer (MLRO) should be appointed within a law firm. This is usually a senior member of the firm who has access to all files so that they can effectively design AML compliance systems and processes. All file handlers within the firm should be aware of the warning signs and they should know who to report suspicious activity to.

How can Proclaim Help?

To assist with the compliance of the new AML rules, Legal Practice Support’s Proclaim Development team has created a process to ensure a strong anti-money laundering process can be implemented for all case types within the Proclaim software itself. We have set up the following to ensure compliance of AML is made as easy as possible for your law firm:

Vetting Process

LPS have developed an anti-money laundering process to ensure all new clients are vetted for money laundering risks. This process can be set up to mandatorily form part of any case type. As firms are required by legislation to have a risk assessment in place, it is therefore of paramount importance that you have fully compliant processes in place.

Following the AML rules and the guidance set out by the SRA, the process created by Legal Practice Support mandatorily requires any new client to have been fully risk assessed. There is also a requirement within the process for warning signs of money laundering to be checked and for all ID documentation to have been provided from the outset.

Any high risks, or warnings signs identified are then flagged to the relevant person within the business.  From here, instructions can either be approved, rejected, or further information requested.

Reporting

To ensure compliance with the AML rules, a single report can be provided to offer a summary of Management Information. This will ensure that full money laundering checks are completed by all staff.  The report will flag all cases that have not had checks completed, or those with which there are outstanding Manager approvals.  This ensures no case is left unaudited, and that there is no way of cases ‘slipping through the net’.  This ensures a fully compliant anti-money laundering process is in place for all cases.

How can Legal Practice Support Help?

If you would like to discuss how to incorporate rigorous anti-money laundering processes into your Proclaim system, or to discuss general Proclaim development, please do not hesitate to contact james.denby@legalpracticesupport.co.uk for further information.

James Denby is Head of Proclaim Development at Legal Practice Support and possesses in excess of eight years’ experience, both in-house and as an external consultant, in developing legal case management systems.  James is also uniquely in the position of having worked as a Senior Manager within a law firm, and as having conducted his own caseload as an experienced Paralegal.  As a seasoned Proclaim Developer, James understands the requirements of any IT system/workflow/task from the view of the user, as well as from an IT perspective.

Proclaim Development – Document Automation

Solicitors spend an extraordinary amount of their time preparing routine letters and standard forms/Court documents, all of which contain a significant amount of generic information.  Document automation increases the efficiency in preparing these items whilst reducing errors, and improving the client experience.

What Can Document Automation with Proclaim Achieve?

Generic information is repeatedly inserted into routine documentation.  Such information can be in the form of party details, title, address amongst many other things.  Proclaim is able to automatically enter a document template and insert the relevant fields within the same.  Through document automation, an extensive array of letter/document templates can be created with minimal effort.

In addition, with the burdens placed on Solicitors in modern litigation, it can be easy for a file handler to forget to provide clients with updates at certain points of litigation. Proclaim can, therefore, be developed to ensure clients are provided with routine updates on a regular basis, and at specific points during the life-cycle of their case/claim.

What Benefits Does Document Automation Achieve?

Information of any individual or party will only ever need to be entered once into the Proclaim Case Management System.  This inevitably means that masses of time can be saved on routine tasks, such as preparing client care packs, or providing routine updates to a client.  If developed correctly, document automation can ensure that Court documents are prepared with default settings that can be altered by a file handler if required.

Document automation also vastly reduces the level of errors that arise in documentation through human error, and significantly improves the client experience, ensuring all clients are properly updated whenever they reach certain trigger-points of their instructions or claim.

How Can We Implement Document Automation into Proclaim?

Increasing the level of any aspect of automation within Proclaim will vastly reduce the administrative element of your team’s workload, and increase their efficiency and profitability as a result.

To learn more, get in touch with our Head Proclaim Developer, James Denby, at Legal Practice Support here

James Denby is Head of Proclaim Development at Legal Practice Support and possesses in excess of eight years’ experience, both in-house and as an external consultant, in developing legal case management systems.  James is also uniquely in the position of having worked as a Senior Manager within a law firm, and as having conducted his own caseload as an experienced Paralegal.  As a seasoned Proclaim Developer, James understands the requirements of any IT system/workflow/task from the view of the user, as well as from an IT perspective.

Can Proclaim Assist in Preventing Money Laundering?

Money laundering within the legal profession has faced significant legal press exposure in recent months.  Legal Practice Support’s Proclaim Development team has therefore created a process to ensure a strong anti-money laundering process can be implemented for all case types within the Proclaim software itself.

SRA Targets Hundreds of Firms

The SRA has recently pulled up a large number of firms for having inadequate anti-money laundering checks in place, with more than 40 Solicitors struck-off or suspended in the last five years for failing to have adequate protections in place.

Vetting Process

LPS have developed an anti-money laundering process, that can mandatorily form part of any case type to ensure all new clients are vetted for money laundering risks.  Firms are required by legislation to have risk assessments in place, and so it is of the utmost importance that you have fully compliant processes in place.

Following the guidance set out by the SRA, the process created by LPS mandatorily requires any new client to have been fully risk assessed, for warning signs of money laundering to be checked, and for all ID documentation to have been provided from the outset.  Any high risks, or warnings signs identified are then flagged to a Manager or the COLP.  From here, instructions can either be approved, rejected, or further information requested.

Reporting

To ensure that full money laundering checks are completed by all staff, a single report can be provided to offer a summary of Management Information.  This will flag all cases that have not had checks completed, or those with which there are outstanding Manager approvals.  This ensures no case is left unaudited, and that there is no way of cases ‘slipping through the net’.  This ensures a fully compliant anti-money laundering process is in place for all cases.

Find Out More ……

If you would like to discuss how to incorporate rigorous anti-money laundering processes into your Proclaim system, or to discuss general Proclaim development, please do not hesitate to contact james.denby@legalpracticesupport.co.uk for further information.

James Denby is Head of Proclaim Development at Legal Practice Support and possesses in excess of eight years’ experience, both in-house and as an external consultant, in developing legal case management systems.  James is also uniquely in the position of having worked as a Senior Manager within a law firm, and as having conducted his own caseload as an experienced Paralegal.  As a seasoned Proclaim Developer, James understands the requirements of any IT system/workflow/task from the view of the user, as well as from an IT perspective.

Proclaim Development – Management Information (MI) Reports

The Proclaim Development team at Legal Practice Support (LPS) is often tasked with providing MI (Management Information) reports to the managerial users of Proclaim.

 On What can MI Reporting be Effective?

Owing to the vast amount of data stored within any Proclaim system, there is an extensive amount of Management Information that can be analysed.  Proclaim comes with its own standard set of reports however, bespoke reports can be developed that are tailored to the business’ individual needs.  These can be on any MI data held within the Proclaim system, the most frequently sought after of which are financial, compliance and workflow orientated reports.

Why Should I be Interested in MI Reports? 

We are in a digital age which affords us the opportunity to examine Management Information data with greater ease and more scrutiny.  Further with the expansion of fixed costs throughout much of the legal industry, it is important to ensure all processes are conducted in the most cost-effective manner.  MI reporting can greatly assist in improving profitability and reducing inefficiency.  This may be through identifying and managing key bottlenecks in processes, or determining the most profitable behaviours.  Reporting data to external agencies on issues such as WIP and case progression can also be greatly reduced to the click of a single button or none at all if you wish to receive them automatically via email at scheduled times.

Management Information Reporting Examples

• Progression Reports – Are tasks being completed?
• Age Reports – What is the age of your caseload?
• Profitability – Who is generating the most profit overall/per file, per claim type or per department?
• WIP – Calculate the total firm WIP for reporting purposes, or in relation to certain case types or file handlers.

LPS provide an in-depth summary of important reports that can be developed here.

If you would like to discuss how to implement extended MI reporting into your Proclaim system, please do not hesitate to contact james.denby@legalpracticesupport.co.uk for further information. 

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Proclaim Development

James Denby is Head of Proclaim Development at Legal Practice Support and possesses in excess of eight years’ experience, both in-house and as an external consultant, in developing legal case management systems. James is also uniquely in the position of having worked as a Senior Manager within a law firm, and as having conducted his own caseload as an experienced Paralegal. As such James understands the requirements of any IT system/workflow/task from the view of the user, as well as from an IT perspective.

Proclaim Development Case Study – Third Party Proclaim Integration with an ATE Insurer

The Proclaim Development team of LPS were instructed by an ATE insurer to assist with the integration of their third party data, directly into their Solicitor clients’ Proclaim case management system.

What Was the Issue?

At the time of instruction, the Solicitor client was manually requesting ATE policies on each new file they required a policy on. These instructions were then sent to the ATE provider, who opened the policy and prepared the relevant documentation.   This was then emailed back to the Solicitor. The policy documentation thereafter had to be manually dragged onto the digital file.

This approach inevitably led to errors, with policies either being missed/inefficiently created.  Full documentation also not always being dragged onto the Solicitor’s digital file.

Solution

LPS therefore developed the Solicitor’s Proclaim system so that on the pressing of a button, a client’s data (which had previously been entered into a Case Details screen) was automatically exported directly into the ATE insurer’s system using secure web technologies. On processing of the information, the policy was auto-created by the ATE insurer almost instantaneously.  The relevant documentation was returned and auto-uploaded directly into the Proclaim case history.

This ultimately saved a significant amount of time for all involved.  Policies could be created automatically as soon as a case was setup by the clients admin team and approval had been given to enter into the policy. Furthermore it vastly reduced user error by pushing data directly from the clients Proclaim system directly into the ATE provider’s system. Additionally, the auto-uploading of documentation to the Proclaim case history helped ensure no policy documentation was missed on any cases.

Are There Other Applications?

There are a vast number of web-related services that can be integrated to work with Proclaim to automate processes using a Proclaim developer. Other examples can include integration with medical agencies, hire companies, and Government Agencies.  Integration could be achieved with any other third party that allows for web technologies to integrate directly into their system.  To discuss how to incorporate third party integration into your Proclaim system, please do not hesitate to contact james.denby@legalpracticesupport.co.uk for further information.

James Denby is Head of Proclaim Development at Legal Practice Support and possesses in excess of eight years’ experience, both in-house and as an external consultant, in developing legal case management systems. James is also uniquely in the position of having worked as a Senior Manager within a law firm, and as having conducted his own caseload as an experienced Paralegal. As such James understands the requirements of any IT system/workflow/task from the view of the user, as well as from an IT perspective.

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Proclaim Development Case Study – Automating Fixed Costs

The Proclaim Development team of Legal Practice Support (LPS) was tasked with automating the fixed costs process for a personal injury department, dealing in low value (below £25,000) claims in Road Traffic Accidents, Employer’s Liability and Occupier’s Liability claims.

What was the Issue?

At the point of instruction, on settling any case the file handler was required to manually prepare a fixed costs schedule based on the details provided in CPR 45, and also to manually insert the disbursements figures. Inevitably, in a fast-moving post-Jackson department which requires fee earners to be focussed on progressing cases, the last thing on fee earner’s minds was dealing with costs. This ultimately led to costly errors arising, including the failure to claim the correct fixed costs, to recover some disbursements, and in significant delay in costs being paid.

Cashflow is integral to any company, and therefore LPS was instructed to automate the fixed costs calculation and recovery process in order to streamline the process, and to minimise errors arising.

Solution

LPS developed a system whereby based on the clients damages and selection criteria on case conclusion, the fixed costs were automatically calculated and detailed in a costs schedule, and disclosed to the Defendant. Disbursements were standardised dependant upon the case type and correspondents utilised, so that a file handler would need to consciously ‘opt-out’ of attaching a relevant disbursement voucher and its corresponding details such as value and reference. The process was tied into the accounts system so that incurred disbursements not only automatically flagged within the cost schedule but it also provided an easy checklist for accounts to review along with the physical invoices and the relevant details all in one place.

On approval, the costs schedule was automatically disclosed to the ‘on-record’ paying party and the disbursement invoices were all automatically consolidated into a single document then attached to the cost schedule. If no response was received within specific timescales, the outstanding costs were automatically chased.

Outcome

As a result of this process, the errors in claiming the correct level of fixed costs were eliminated, and the failure to recover all disbursements incurred was vastly reduced. This was without any significant change in fee earner behaviour and actually reduced the level of time spent by any individual on administrative costs work.

Extension of Process

With the extension of fixed costs proposed to extend to claims of up to £100,000 in the near future, now is the time to ensure your fixed costs processes are up to speed and accurate. Further extension of the process could incorporate links into the accounts system, to auto raise payments (to be approved) to third parties on receipt of settlement monies, or to feed into an enforcement process to ensure an application is lodged for failure by a paying party to raise funds in a timely fashion.

If you would like to discuss how to expand the automation of your fixed costs system, or to discuss general Proclaim development, please do not hesitate to contact james.denby@legalpracticesupport.co.uk for further information.

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James Denby is Head of Proclaim Development at Legal Practice Support and possesses in excess of eight years’ experience, both in-house and as an external consultant, in developing legal case management systems. James is also uniquely in the position of having worked as a Senior Manager within a law firm, and as having conducted his own caseload as an experienced Paralegal. As such James understands the requirements of any IT system/workflow/task from the view of the user, as well as from an IT perspective.

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Why Choose Eclipse Proclaim When Going Paperless

Top Five Proclaim Enhancements

Proclaim is a great bit of kit and can be used straight out of the box, especially if you have also purchased some of the additional workflow packages that Eclipse Legal provide. However, if you want to get the most out of the software and ensure that the expensive desktop icon you’ve purchased translates into increased revenue for your Firm, then bespoke development and Proclaim enhancements by a skilled specialist is a must.

To that end here are the top 5 Proclaim enchantments that we at LPS know will repay your initial investment in spades;

Custom reports are one of many Proclaim enhancements available. While Proclaim comes with some great default reports out of the boxes, it won’t be long before you realise you need to create some bespoke reports that work for your Firm’s unique needs.

Do you specialise in holiday claims and need to know which holiday provider or region is responsible for the most successful claims so that you can adjust your marketing strategy accordingly? Are you a Firm that needs to know which CMC provides you with the best quality claims, so you’re not having your Fee Earners waste their time running duds? Are you a Clinical Negligence Specialist that wants to know how lucrative each claim is so that you can better target your marketing and focus on those high-value claims?

Proclaim is a database and in the right hands, it can be used to answer all of the above questions and much, much more. At LPS we’ve yet to encounter a set of data we’ve not been able to provide by producing a bespoke Proclaim report.  Needless to say, the Firms that utilise the reporting functionality of Proclaim to its greatest extent can make quicker and more informed business decisions than those that rely on gut feelings.

While you can drag documentation into Proclaim, manually this can quickly become a tedious and time-consuming exercise. Not to mention risky, when you are relying on individuals to drag documentation in manually themselves. With the correct development and software integration, you can ensure all of your Firm’s documentation is automatically imported into Proclaim.

The benefits of an automatic scanning solution cannot be overstated, while the upfront development costs can seem expensive, most Firms see the initial investment returned in savings within the first 6-12 months. Beyond that point not only are you likely saving substantial sums of money every month but you’ll also be ensuring every bit of paper correspondence that enters your Firm’s doors is added into Proclaim automatically.

The most apparent advantages of this are that you can monitor who is and is not dealing with their correspondence via custom reporting. Furthermore, if you have sufficiently optimised your workflow you can set triggers to create automated actions when the correspondence is imported such as notifying the client you have obtained his medical report.

With the right setup, you can go as far as scanning the contents of the letter and dealing with it appropriately. Does it refer to a Court Order or perhaps a Part 36 offer? Once you are automatically scanning your incoming correspondence, you can ensure that this sort of critical documentation is never missed and ends up in the rights hands rather than sitting in a Fee Earners desk tray indefinitely.

While every Firm is going to undoubtedly have similarities in the way it conducts itself, (after all how many ways can you submit a CNF?) there are going to be key differences and bespoke precedents that will be utilised along the way. After all, do you want to risk losing out on indemnity costs because a Fee Earner forgot to draft a paragraph into a Part 36 offer letter rather than using the Firm approved precedent? Or continue running a claim via the MOJ portal when it timed out months ago but the Fee Earner found it easier to settle the claim by keeping it on the portal. Or found out one week before trial that the CNF was never submitted in the first instance?

Key Proclaim enhancements for workflows correctly ensure your files follow have a set path in a way that suits your Firms needs, and will ensure all cases are run in a preapproved manner, which will reduce the likelihood of any negligent mistakes being made and that they are progressed as efficiently as possible. Rather than having your Fee Earners manually draught their letters or trawl through a list of Proclaim letters trying to find the correct one, it’s much more effective to have a one click solution in place.

For instance, optimise your workflow so that at the press of one button the four letters that you have approved to be drafted when issuing proceedings are created and all the requisite details pulled in automatically from your Proclaim system, this will reduce an hour long process to minutes. When you are disclosing your client’s medical report to the third party, why not automatically send an SMS to the client notifying them of this? It’ll reduce the likelihood of a client telephone your Fee Earners to ask for an update, thus freeing the Fee Earners up to generate more revenue and bring the claim to a conclusion more promptly.

At LPS we know that no matter how complex a system may seem, in the right hands it can be effectively mapped and optimised into an efficient and effective Proclaim system.

Web services in Proclaim terms are effectively any system that relies on web technology to integrate an external system with your Proclaim system. Proclaim enhancements to web services can be particularly beneficial for law firms.

The obvious examples would be the stock A2A or Land Registry integration that can be purchased from Eclipse, this itself can be further enhanced in the right hands. For instance, do Fee Earners keep forgetting to attach the physio invoice onto the portal, why not automate that with a some of the bespoke development?

You might have a provider who you work closely with, ATE Insurer for example. Why not setup a web service to automate the process, with the click of a button you could feed your data directly into their system and pull back an ATE Certificate automatically attaching it to your system. It’s a solution that can be applied to any provider that offers a web service at their end; you just need the expertise to connect your Proclaim system and theirs together.

Or maybe you receive claims via your website and end up losing the leads due to poor response times. Why not link it in directly to your Proclaim system so an enquiry case is setup, and an automated SMS is sent to the prospective client advising them that claim has been received and that an advisor will be in touch shortly. Introducing a web service integration between your Proclaim system and your website could reduce the amount of lost prospective clients substantially and in turn translate into increased revenue for your Firm.

Proclaim enhancements can also be used to optimise task servers. Task Servers are an amazing tool that very few Firms utilise to full effect. Most are just left chugging along, performing the default actions that will have been in place since the time you had proclaim installed, such as sending faxes, SMS messages, and any default web services.

However, they are a vital tool that can be used to automate any repetitive action freeing up more time for fee earning staff to be performing actual fee earning rather than administrative tasks. Furthermore, they can be utilised to ensure you always have most up-to-date information at your fingertips. Want an hourly report tracking your Firms billed hours for the month and don’t want to watch as your screen freezes and your mouse become a swirling circle of loading doom? Then use a task server to ensure you don’t even need to think about that report running, you’ll just find a fresh copy in your mailbox hourly, or however frequently you need it.

This list of Proclaim enhancements is certainly not exhaustive, and each area has considerably more application that this article has time to delve into. However, should you want to know more about anything in this article or perhaps some other areas that fall outside the top 5  Proclaim enhancements, then don’t hesitate to contact our Legal IT Director at james.denby@legalpracticesupport.co.uk. 

Check out our Proclaim development web pages to find out how a Proclaim developer could assist your firm.

Proclaim Reports You Never Knew You Needed

Proclaim is in essence a database that in the right hands can be used to produce comprehensive and enlightening reports for your business. At LPS we’ve yet to encounter a set of data we have not been able to provide by producing bespoke Proclaim Reports.  Needless to say, the businesses that utilise the reporting functionality of Proclaim to its greatest extent can make quicker and more informed business decisions than those that rely on gut feelings.  Whilst straight forward, Proclaim Reports can be one of the most effective forms of Proclaim Development.

Supplier / Service provider Profitability

Understanding the profitability of each supplier your business utilises, is essential for minimising wastage, maximising efficiency and therefore increasing your profit margins. Consequently, it’s of paramount importance that you are able to determine who your most profitable suppliers of work or services are.

This means by way of example, that you now have the capabilities to ascertain the failure rate of cases that suppliers send to you. For instance, while Supplier A may seemingly supply more successful cases than Supplier B, what percentage of those cases are the successful ones? It sounds obvious but many businesses fail to assess the success rate of their work. If your fee earners are having to run 3 cases from Supplier A before they get a successful case, it may be less beneficial to work with them than Supplier B. After all, you pay your fee earners to run cases, if they are spending 75% of their time running unsuccessful cases this is a terrible use of time and by extension money.

It’s the same principle for other suppliers of course, does Barrister A achieve better results than B, which Cost Draftsman is getting you the most profit per case and which Medical Expert is turning around your reports the quickest?

Risk Profiling Report

Naturally as well as analysing which supplier is the most profitable for your business you should also utilise Proclaim to analyse which of your businesses revenue streams provides you the best return on your investment.

While it may be great that your firm has hundreds of clinical negligence, RTA or immigration cases, what is the actual percentage of these that will successfully conclude?  Then out of those that are successful, what will the profit be when compared to the investment you have made in terms of marketing spend, staff salaries and other such overheads?  Proclaim Reports in this area can be critical to improving percentage success rates and minimising lost WIP.

Progression Report

In the legal industry recent and pending reforms have increased the need for all processes to be as efficient as possible. Automating processes will increase efficiency and will allow staff to work with higher volumes, but you will also need oversight of all these cases that is both meaningful and easily accessible; it is too easy after all, for a file handler to put that difficult case to one side and focus on the more straight forward cases.

The idea behind Proclaim Reports for progression is that you can breakdown any process into its key stages whether this be assembling flat pack furniture or in this instance running clients’ cases. All cases will have a beginning, a conclusion and multiple stages in between. The start generally would be vetting the case and the end would be submitting a final bill for the work done. A good illustration would be a typical personal injury case where you would want to breakdown the case into stages. Such stages may include: the procurement of signed identification and retainer documentation; the requesting and receipt of a date for a medical appointment and report; or whether the pre-action period has expired and the case is now ready for issue.

The obvious benefit to this kind of reporting is that you can quickly identify any bottlenecks in your workflows. If 50% of your work is stuck in a certain stage it will allow you to identify and rectify any issues before the consequences of the problem catch up with your cash flow. Additionally, you can quickly see how work is progressing, if 75% of the cases are still at the beginning of the progression report stages, you know these are unlikely to convert into revenue anytime soon and you can forecast accordingly.

Work Age Report

Leading on from progression reports, work age reports are also essential when trying to keep oversight of large volumes of work.

These Proclaim Reports will give you a breakdown of your cases and the length of time in which they have been running. The primary purpose of this reporting is so you can work out average conclusion times of cases, as well as ascertain where all of your businesses work sits within that time period. This helps with financial planning, especially when you utilise it in tandem with reports such as the work failure rate or a supplier profitability report.

For instance, a firm has 1000 cases, if you know that after analysing the work age report cases take 12 months to conclude and that 20% of your businesses work is still within the first 3 months of its life, that’s 200 cases that will not settle for another 9 months. You might also know by reviewing a work type failure rate report that 25% of these cases fail and consequently you will only be left with 150 of these cases by the time they conclude.

Furthermore, if you had a profit report that shows the average net profit per case being £1,000 you could project with reasonable accuracy that you would likely bill £150,000 in 9 month’s time.

Closing Remarks on Proclaim Reports

The benefit of robust and accurate Proclaim Reports cannot be overstated when running a successful business. Attempting to make sound business decisions without the appropriate information in your possession will almost always prove impossible. Of course the ability to accurately and efficiently pull data from your system will be limited by the extent to which your system has been developed. If you have limited automated workflows and rely on staff to manually input data, it will only ever be as good as the individuals inputting that data and as we all know, individuals are often prone to error through no fault of their own.

Consequently, to get the most from your reporting you should always seek to develop your system and its workflows. The more automated it is, the less prone to human error it will be and the more accurate your dataset and reports will be as a result.

This list is certainly not exhaustive, and should you want to know more about anything in this article or perhaps some other areas that fall outside the top 4 Proclaim Reports, then don’t hesitate to contact our Legal IT Director at james.denby@legalpracticesupport.co.uk

Proclaim Risk Management

At Legal Practice Support we have yet to meet a solicitor who enjoys regulatory compliance. It’s a monotonous job after all, nobody will thank you for getting in the way of practising law or slowing the speed in which a case might be concluded. The role is so often reduced to box-ticking and paper trails. This is where a Proclaim Risk Management system can help.

As a consequence of this with smaller firms we tend to see either a lax approach to compliance or compliance outsourcing to a compliance consultant at a cost of course. For bigger firms it is difficult to outsource the job and they often have the resources to deal in house. This does not however, mean it is always dealt with commercially, efficiently or even effectively.

An effective solution would be to adopt a software approach such as developing a Proclaim Risk Management System, which is something we at Legal Practice Support have extensive experience undertaking.

Risk File Reviews

Too often it is thought of that compliance is the responsibility of the senior management and compliance officers but this is not how the regulators see things. Compliance is seen to be the responsibility of every employee within your firm. By using Proclaim to develop a comprehensive compliance platform you can ensure that all employees are involved in the process by creating one centralised system.

A Proclaim Risk Management System can be developed to allow everyone to easily conduct audits, report on incidents and deal with any other compliance related tasks. This will all help ensure that dealing with compliance becomes a shared culture within your business taking the pressure off senior management and compliance officers.

Risk Management

Proclaim can be utilised to create task management workflows where you can plan, track and action all compliance activity. Furthermore the system automates tasks and ensures that all activity is tracked and dealt with efficiently and within your prescribed timescales. By utilising proclaim you can take a proactive approach to risk and compliance, ensuring that you never again miss an action date.  Further, completion of tasks can be prohibited until certain documentation has been placed on file.  For instance, has the CFA been signed and received before significant costs are incurred in the absence of a retainer, has a pre-Trial risk review been completed before the substantial costs of preparing for Trial and instructing Counsel have arisen?  Is the file handler instructing Counsel from a pre-approved list of suppliers who are known to have a good success rate?

Risk Reporting

Arguably one of the most important aspects of a comprehensive and effective risk management system is the ability to produce reports. Proclaim Risk Management System allows you to produce full compliance reports that can be scaled to your own bespoke requirements. This enables you to instantly see an overview of the whole landscape or drill down a specific section.

Using a Proclaim Risk Management System users could do things such as track risks by department or work type. Build up a dynamic risk register categorising by risk level, likelihood and consequence. Furthermore, you could utilise Proclaim Risk Management System to produce mitigation strategies, allocating tasks to those responsible for controlling risk within your firm and effectively track and monitor these tasks by reporting on them.

Risk Workflows

Automated workflows drive efficiency, ensure consistency and increase visibility. By developing a Proclaim Risk Management System you can replace inefficient spreadsheet based processes with highly automated solutions that are not prone to error. Additionally, you would reduce the time and cost spent on managing compliance by having a structured and well thought out workflow in place.

A Proclaim Risk Management System allows you to optimise your processes and improve the consistency of your reporting. Increase your team’s productivity through organised communication & collaboration all in addition to controlling and enhancing your compliance culture.

Individual Risk Review

Additionally, you can utilise Proclaim to analyse trends in individual employees or certain case types or demographics. I.e. is a certain employee more prone to error on a certain case type or in general? Are certain cases more likely to incur adverse costs than others? Information like this will allow you to gradually adapt how you monitor your cases so those with the biggest risk are easily identified early on.

This would allow you to produce a comprehensive risk register highlighting both employees that are more prone to incurring adverse cost and case types which are likely to do the same. This sort of data can prove crucial for HR departments when conducting appraisals and similarly for the practice when determining which case types to take on or supplier to utilise.

Incident management

A Proclaim Risk Management System can be designed to help law firms record, track and manage incidents, including the resulting actions needed to resolve any issues that may arise. You could efficiently record and track incidents, automatically assign them to relevant parties and create and track any actions needed to resolve the matter. Proclaim should be utilised to manage the following;

• Compliance Reporting
• Complaints Management
• Professional Indemnity Claims Management
• Misconduct Reporting
• Risk Register
• Anti-Money Laundering
• File Handler Risk Record (Adverse Costs)
• Many others

Document storage

An often overlooked area of comprehensive compliance solution would be document storage. You can utilise a Proclaim Risk Management System to securely store all documentation relevant to your firm’s compliance needs.

Collaboration and information sharing is an essential part of maintaining efficient compliance and quality workflows. Proclaim as a database is the ideal solution with the ability to store documents centrally and to record any documentation directly to the relevant incident you are working on. For example, you could store the following, all within a secure and password-protected digital environment if required;

• Complaints
• Disciplinary documentation
• Risk Register
• File Audits
• Undertakings
• Anti-Money Laundering

Closing Remarks

Compliance is a necessary but often daunting aspect of any law firm. Fortunately, the modern and more demanding requirements can be made much easier by utilising a modern and more efficient comprehensive electronic solution such as a Proclaim Risk Management System.

Check out our Proclaim development web pages to find out how a Proclaim developer could assist your firm.

This article while comprehensive does not provide an exhaustive list of ways in which Proclaim can enhance the way your law firm deal with compliance. Each area has considerably more application than this article has time to delve into. However, should you want to know more about anything in this article or perhaps some other areas that fall outside a Proclaim Risk Management System, then don’t hesitate to contact us here or contact our Legal IT Director via email at james.denby@legalpracticesupport.co.uk