Robert Ambrogi Blog
It has been a year since I last checked in with MyCase, the cloud practice management platform. Over that time, the company has continued to add new features and improve existing ones. Here are some of the most-notable enhancements made in recent months.
E-Signatures for PDF Documents
In August, MyCase added e-signatures for PDF retainer agreements, simplifying the process of signing up new clients. Since then, it has extended the e-signature capability to any PDF. Documents can be sent for signature from directly within MyCase, and clients or other recipients can sign them from their computer or mobile device, after which both parties receive copies automatically and the document is saved within MyCase.
Online Intake Forms
MyCase now allows you to create intake forms that you can send to potential clients or have them fill out in the office. The information clients provide in the form is then immediately accessible to you within MyCase, avoiding the need to manually enter the information. Firms can create different intake forms for different types of matters, and either insert preconfigured form fields or add custom fields.
Lead Dashboard and Lead Analytics
MyCase now has a set of tools for tracking and managing new-client leads and referral sources through a central dashboard that includes a suite of lead analytics tools. Leads are added in much the same way new contacts are added, and if you convert the lead to a client, the corresponding information is transferred to your system.
Among the features of this dashboard are the ability to add specific case details for a lead, upload documents for a lead, and create and assign follow-up tasks for yourself or others in the firm.
The dashboard includes analytics that let you track lead conversions in the current month versus all time, lead additions in the current month versus all time, top referral sources, top reasons leads did not convert, and more.
Case Insight Dashboard
This new dashboard provides law firms with visual overviews of data for five key metrics: total cases open and what has happened with them in the past 30 days, open cases by practice areas, cases by stage (such as discovery or mediation), average duration of each case stage, and cases opened and closed over time. These charts can be filtered to show only results for a specific attorney, practice area or office.
Case List Report
The Case List Report feature allows you to run and view reports on your cases using various filters or using your own custom fields.
The report can be filtered to show cases based on their open/closed status, firm users, lead attorney, practice area, case stage, office, and date range. You can also group cases by practice area, firm user, client, and fee structure.
You can customize these reports in two ways. First, you can customize the columns shown in the report, either by removing or rearranging standard fields or by adding custom fields. Second, you can create custom queries based on specific custom field data. MyCase offers the example of an estate planning lawyer who wants to generate a list of all cases that have an estate worth more than $50,000.
Once you create a custom report, you can save the configuration for later use.
Financial Insights Dashboard
This is another new dashboard view available in MyCase. This one provides a visual overview of your firm’s financial data, so that you can better understand your firm’s profitability and productivity.
The Financial Insights dashboard provides views of three key financial areas: collected versus billed amounts, collected amounts by practice area, and hours recorded by employee. Any of these views can be further filtered by any combination of date range, assigned lead attorney, practice area, and assigned office.
By default, only the firm’s master users can view this dashboard. Others can be given access through permission settings.
Automatic Payment Plans
Firms can now make it easy for clients to pay their invoices in installments through a new automated payment plan feature. Payment terms can be set up manually or generated automatically. Once a payment plan is set up, your client’s credit card will be automatically charged on the scheduled installment dates.
Staff Tasks and Events Reminders
These features allow users to create tasks; assign them to other attorneys, paralegal and staff in the firm; and set reminders to ensure they do not fall through the cracks. This can be set to also allow users to easily create time entries associated with tasks.
Reminders can be set to go to all individuals within a firm who fall into a certain user type and are associated with the task. For example, the reminder could be set to go to all attorneys or all paralegals associated with the task.
Client tasks and Reminders
In addition to allowing you to create staff tasks and reminders, MyCase now also lets you ask tasks to clients. Clients are notified when new tasks are assigned to them, and the tasks appear in the client portal.
When a client marks a task as complete, the task goes into “Needs Confirmation” status until someone in the firm verifies that it is complete.
Text Message Reminders for Events and Invoices
MyCase now allows text messaging to remind clients of upcoming events or for invoice payments.
For events, when you create a calendar event for a client and choose to share it with the client, you can opt to add a text-message reminder. Alternatively, you can set up text reminders as the default for all events shared with clients.
For invoices, you can use text messaging to send your clients a link for them to pay. After you create an invoice in MyCase, you will see a mobile phone icon at the top. By clicking on this, you can send the client the text link.
For anyone interested in keeping up with developments at MyCase, the company maintains a What’s New? page that lists recent additions. The MyCase Blog also reports new features.