DPS have introduced a powerful new Precedent H billing system into Outlook Office, their , as part of their continuing efforts to enable modern legal businesses to manage costs more efficiently, encourage forward planning and engender increased transparency for the client. The new module is fully compliant with the requirements of the Ministry of Justice and it allows users to enter estimated costs for relevant work types. Disbursements will be recorded directly from the matter diary and incurred costs are shown in real time.
The Precedent H option can be activated with a few mouse clicks and works in sync with the standard time recording features within Outlook Office. This level of integration provides users with a more efficient method of recording time and costs and it enables them to increase their billable work while minimising the risk of erroneous data input.
In order to help law firms keep the costs under control, the system offers a summary of costs/budget so the management can easily see if they are overspending. Expenses can also be entered ‘’per fee earner’’ should the manager want to compare the costs and revenue generated by a particular employee.
The entire Precedent H can be downloaded from within DPS in XLS format with summaries also available as Word documents.
Scott Ridley, the technical director at DPS commented on the news: “We have been long-time proponents of the idea that law firms need to start operating like businesses. The entry of alternative business structures to the market only heightens the urgency of this change in both mind-set and actions. Through the introduction of the new Precedent H billing functions within our case management system, we aim to facilitate this shift in behaviour and enable our clients to take their cost and profit management efforts to the next level.”
The module’s integration to ), our legal accounting system, means that the data is pulled directly into FD, automating the process even further and making it less time-consuming.
