Technolawyer recently released 20+ page “Buyer’s Guide to Legal Billing Software.” The most useful aspect of this report is a discussion of the various criteria you might want to use in order to select a program, including on the merits of cloud-based vs. network-based (which they call “native”) software. It also examines at some time and billing length features that many law firms may need: Timers, Time Entry procedures, billing features (PDF/email generation), support for LEDES billing, Consolidated and Split billing, Trust Accounting (a deal-breaker feature), various productivity reports, and so on. This should let someone new to legal billing make a check-list of features they will need for their practice before trying to evaluate specific software.
The Guide lists 22 software programs, 12 network-based and 10 cloud-based, which shows the inroads cloud-based software has made. With so many programs it is obviously impossible to deal with any particular program substantively, although in some cases the report refers to reviews published elsewhere by Technolawyer.
The main omission is that these programs may or may not include accounting capabilities which are obviously closely related to time and billing. Thus there is virtually no mention of the 800 lb. Gorilla, QuickBooks. Bottom line is: QuickBooks is bad choice for legal accounting needs. Firms need a time & billing program that will do accounting as well.
Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the report is an attempt to estimate the cost of the various programs for 1, 5 and 25 lawyers over a 3-year period. Since Technolawyer relied on vendors for pricing, some of the prices listed are almost certainly too low, in some cases much too low. Further, since they took a three-year time frame and pro-rated it backwards, the price for the first year is lower than what your upfront cost will be. Lastly, the price is just for software, it does not include any associated hardware costs. But it does give you a good ballpark. It also validates what I have always said: over a three-year period, cloud-based software is likely to be more expensive than network-based software. Thus of the major programs the report lists with which I have some familiarity, the most expensive would be Houdini, Esq. (cloud), followed by Amicus Billing (network), Clio (cloud), Time Matters (network), Rocket Matter (cloud) and PCLaw (network) with the estimated cost ranging from $11,520 for Houdini to $4,361 for PCLaw.
In short, this report is a useful starting point, but you will have to examine specific programs separately once you have prepared your “wish list” of features you (a) absolutely must have, (b) need, and (c) would be nice to have.
You can get a copy of the report at
http://www.technolawyer.com/tll/legal-billing-software.aspYou have to join Technolawyer to get the report, but that is free and Technolawyer is well worth joining anyway.