03 May Breaking down the best bookkeeping software for your law practice

Keeping your books organized in your law office is easier when you have bookkeeping software. Though no program can completely replace the human entering information into the system, it can make things much easier and save you valuable billable hours. Today we are breaking down the best bookkeeping software for your law practice.

The top two software program that we would recommend for your law office is PC Law and Clio Practice Management. Though some law practices do use QuickBooks, and we can certainly help you with that as well, we won’t be talking about QuickBooks as that is not our recommended software. If you do use QuickBooks you can find more information about that in our post here.

PC LAW

PC Law is a software program that is offered from Lexis Nexis. This is a desktop program, which means accessing it from anywhere can be a bit more tricky and requires more specialized softwares. The nice thing about this software program is that they offer a free thirty days to try it out and see if you like it. From the dashboard, you can easily see not only your calendar and current cases you are working on but also to-do lists. The my business section is where all your bookkeeping information is stored, and it makes it easy to know precisely what you are bringing in and what is going out. From a tracking standpoint, it is also fantastic, and you can also look up different financial reports throughout the year. Some of the key features are:

• Trust accounting
• Contact and client management
• Case and matter management
• Billing
• Accounts payable and receivable
• Expense and time capture
• Reporting
• Security
• Integrations and;
• Visual analytics

Our Review

Most of our clients use PC Law, and that’s not surprising since currently, 13,000 law firms in Canada do. It has also been around longer than Clio which means it has been well used and tested. It has great integrations with other software that your practice may use making it easier overall to use the program. Some reviews online do suggest that the customer service is not the best and it could be more user-friendly, but overall it’s a great program to manage the day in day out tasks.

CLIO PRACTICE MANAGEMENT

Unlike PC Law, Clio is a cloud-based software program. If you want to try it out, they offer a demo program which is slightly different from PC Law. They also have calendar management, and you can assign tasks to any member of your team which is helpful for a larger law firm. The software allows you to track all your bookkeeping and also will enable you to bill and receive money from clients using the programs trust accounting.
Some of the key features are:

• Trust accounting
• Case management
• Document management
• Contact management
• Accounting
• Billing
• Time and expense tracking
• Online payments
• Task management
• Reporting and data
• Workflow and email automation

Our Review

We will confess that most of our clients do use PC Law, but we have used Clio and know that Clio has made changes to its software in recent years. Reviews on the software online say that the customer service is stellar and it offers a referral network with other law offices using the software which could mean more money in your pocket. It’s worth checking out if you are thinking of purchasing or changing your software in your law practice.

Law Society Approved – It’s Important!

There are of course other softwares on the market and more come out every year. One thing to keep in mind is to try and ensure that the software you are using is approved by the Law Society for use. The four that are currently approved are – PCLaw, Clio, Esilaw and Cosmolex. Although we are not as familiar with the later two, we are certain these are ones you could look at when determining which software is best for your practice.

A Word of Caution

Just because you have bookkeeping software doesn’t mean you are entering everything in, correctly. Rochon & Associates is happy to train you on the various bookkeeping software elements to make sure you are using the program successfully to minimize issues down the road. If you are interested in our services, contact us today!