James Chapman & Co Improve Productivity with new Network Dictation System

James Chapman & Co is a long established independent firm with over 100 years’ experience in defendant insurance litigation. The firm is a forward-thinking practice, which has invested in first class people and excellent communication systems to deliver a high standard of service to all its clients. This means the use and development of technology is an integral part of the firm’s progressive outlook.

The Challenge - a full workflow management system

James Chapman & Co is a long established independent firm with over 100 years’ experience in defendant insurance litigation. The firm is a forward-thinking practice, which has invested in first class people and excellent communication systems to deliver a high standard of service to all its clients. This means the use and development of technology is an integral part of the firm’s progressive outlook.

Legal practitioners at the firm produce a range of materials, which are then transcribed by a remote team of administrators. Previously all dictation within the firm was produced using analogue machines, which created a series of problems.

Chris McSpirit, chief financial officer, explained: “The sound quality of the dictation was poor and distributing work effectively to the secretaries proved a challenge, especially when one tape had been used for a series of dictations. It meant that only one secretary could work on the dictation, whereas the job could have been deployed to several, speeding the process immensely.”

“Our team works under intense pressure on a day-to-day basis, running to tight deadlines in stressful situations. Due to the nature of the work, it is crucial that all reporting is undertaken as securely, efficiently and accurately as possible.”

Analysing workflow also proved impossible with the old system and it was difficult for fee earners to control their dictation jobs. It was not easy to monitor which secretary had the dictation for transcribing, and when that transcription was likely to be complete. For secretaries this also caused frustration, as they had no way of knowing how long a piece of taped dictation would be, making it impossible for them to plan their workload effectively.
McSpirit said: “There were huge shortcomings when it came to using an analogue system. We knew there had to be a cost-effective alternative that could streamline the whole process so that the whole team could work more efficiently.”

The new system not only needed to produce a better recording, but also had to manage workflow effectively in order to improve productivity and client response times across the firm. WinScribe offered the solution to the problem.

The Solution – WinScribe

“The WinScribe software could be integrated onto the network, allowing flexibility for the fee earners and the secretaries to manage documents more effectively on a secure network. We choose WinScribe, over its competitors as it had a proven record with ongoingsoftware development to meet users evolving needs - ideal for a progressive law firm such as ours,” continues McSpirit.

The Result - Securtiy and Workflow

Fee earners can access the WinScribe server remotely using a PC with Internet access. All they need is ID and security codes, making the system completely secure, essential for dealing with confidential documents.

An added benefit of the WinScribe software allows fee earners to state the dictation job type, which means that for some confidential cases only certain secretaries will be given access.

“In our industry it’s reassuring to know that we are using a technology that ensures documents are stored on a secure network which only authorised staff can access,” said McSpirit.

The new system has facilitated an improved and more accountable way of working. Not only does it enable performance to be easily monitored, it also ensures transcribing resources can be shared during busy times. The WinScribe system recognises when the author has completed their dictation and automatically sends it to the appropriate transcriber, based on the work type and its priority.

The fee earner also has the option to manually select which secretary they require the dictation to be transcribed by. Secretaries can now log onto the system to view the length of the job, identify what kind of job it is, if it has attachments, when the deadline is and who the job was submitted by.

A huge benefit to fee earners is the capability of attaching documents to the dictation, which may be relevant to the job. WinScribe allows them to refer to saved documents without interrupting the dictation process,“We are intending to roll-out WinScribe to the whole firm during 2006 and we will work closely with WinScribe to further integrate the system with our practice management system, Lawsoft. Through the use of WinScribe we can ensure our work is undertaken securely, efficiently and as accurately as possible,” concluded McSpirit.

DOWNLOAD PDF