How one legal firm seeking to modernise their department, sought help from Exizent and gained unexpected benefits.
| Company Name | Burrell Jenkins Solicitors |
|---|---|
| Company Type | Multi-practice firm |
| Probate Department | 2 employees |
| Office Location(s) | Cannock, England |
“That really showed me the advantages of Exizent because going forward I’d input matters onto the platform, and it was great, really quick, and easy to use! I just click go, click autofill and it automatically does the IHT400, all of the schedules and the PA1A for me! So, all I have to do is proof it, and that takes me about 20 minutes. To go from three and a half to four hours down to 20 minutes is a huge advantage!”
Burrell Jenkins Solicitors have offered bespoke legal services in Cannock, England for over 100 years. Their aim as a company has always been to provide clients with their vast experience and expertise, ensuring that cases are managed with the utmost professionalism and excellence, every time.
Jack Parton, Trainee Solicitor, joined Burrell Jenkins Solicitors in 2020 with a wealth of knowledge, not specifically on probate practices, but in other areas of law from his previous position at a legal 200 firm and within the criminal defence sector. He saw first-hand how technology was a common tool in these roles and the potential that innovative cloud-based software has. It was these skills that Senior Partner, Paul Jenkins, saw as a real advantage to their high street firm and sought advice from Jack on helping the company improve, bringing his experience gained through other firms to help modernise the business, as part of the Private Client department.
First Impressions of Probate
As someone who hadn’t worked in probate before, Jack was able to take a fresh perspective on the department and look at the processes in place. He immediately observed that with no specific software in place it was very much paper-based and highly time consuming. As a team of two, Jack and Julie Minton, Secretary, knew it was vital to make big changes within the department that would significantly reduce time spent on administration and allow the department to grow.
“After spending a bit of time getting my head around how probate works, how you administer estates etc. and as I was just becoming more comfortable with that, it just sort of happened! I got a call from one of the sales team at Exizent who said, ‘we’ve got this great probate platform that I think will really help your business and save you lots of time, would you like a demo?’ And I jumped at the opportunity, had the demo and instantly saw the advantages of the platform!”
Reaping the benefits of introducing technology
There were three big factors in selecting an appropriate software that Jack looked for.
The software had to be user friendly in order for the whole company to successfully adopt and buy into the solution.
The next point, of course, was cost. Jack needed to ensure that the software he chose was cost efficient and that he could successfully show return of investment to the Senior Partner.
That led him to his final point, the software needed to save the team time, so that the company can operate efficiently, and expand.
Exizent ticked all of these boxes for Burrell Jenkins, but it wasn’t until they began to use the software to its full potential that they saw just how important it would be for their department’s growth.
Prior to using the platform, the probate team were completing a large probate case involving around £130,000 in Inheritance tax; this meant a lot of administration, a full IHT400 with schedules and a complete PA1A. Having to use their old process of excel documents and a document sharing solution, meant laborious time spent for both Jack and Julie to complete the case. Speaking of the case Jack commented:
“It took me hours and hours probably about three and a bit hours to get it to a point where I could park it to the side, come back to it at a later date and proof it to make sure it was accurate and OK to send.
That really showed me the advantages of Exizent because going forward I’d input matters onto the platform, and it was great, really quick, and easy to use! I just click go, click autofill and it automatically does the IHT400, all of the schedules and the PA1A for me! So, all I have to do is proof it, and that takes me about 20 minutes. To go from three and a half to four hours down to 20 minutes is a huge advantage!”
Time saving benefits were seen by everyone involved, Julie significantly reduced her time spent on administration per case and was able to focus on other value adding matters. The partners of the firm saw the efficiency benefit with the value of being able to do other tasks and the clients experienced a more streamlined department.
“From a relationship perspective, it improves the relationship with the client and provides that more personal touch which many seek during this difficult time. If our client’s happy and feels we’re “on it”, then ultimately, they are going to trust that their matter is being handled and managed effectively.”
Overcoming pushback
As with introducing any software into a firm, particularly one which ran a certain way for many years, Jack wasn’t surprised to receive a bit of initial reluctance in adopting Exizent’s technology. He made the decision for the department to backfill their cases onto the platform, with the vision that it would make the continuing and completion of the cases much easier. However, this method did involve some heavy administration from Secretary Julie, leading her to be unsure by the latest software introduction and struggling to see the benefits Jack had promised she’d see.
“I had to explain that it’s only workload heavy now, as we’re back-filling the platform but when we open a new matter at the start on Exizent and fill in the information as it comes in – that’s it! We enter it once and when it comes to Grants, where we can deal with the inheritance tax side of things, it’s already all filled in for us! It’s at this point where the savings come in because we enter the information once and the rest is automated, saving us almost half a day’s work!”
Julie had been in probate for 15 years and had always completed cases in a specific way. when Jack first joined the company, he could clearly see that Julie knew probate inside-and-out, and could easily do the full administration on her own but she was doing everything on paper and sending out hundreds of letters. It was these time-consuming methods used within the probate department that Jack urgently wanted to change.
After the initial reluctance from Julie to embrace the platform, she began to see the benefits that Jack saw. Julie commented:
“I’ll be honest, I was quite sceptical of Exizent at the start. However, after two months of using it, I can really see the benefits of the platform, as ultimately, it makes my life a lot easier and considerably reduces the amount of data entry and re-keying required per case.
The biggest thing for me, aside the time saving elements, is that Exizent are continually developing and improving the platform based on user feedback that myself and Jack contribute to! It’s why we are very happy to provide user feedback because it’s great to see our comments come to fruition and make such a difference to our day-to-day tasks.”
Summary
Burrell Jenkins Solicitors have seen the need to innovate and become more streamlined in order to grow the business, particularly their probate department. Knowing this needed to happen through the adoption of technology, is innovative thinking that will help them to continually grow. As a firm they could have continued as they were – it’s worked as it is for so long, why change now? But by identifying the need to invest in tech and employing Jack to take on this role, they have reaped the benefits LegalTech can bring.
“Technology is absolutely needed in the legal sector. Whilst it was obviously a very difficult time we would prefer not to have gone through, one of the benefits of Covid is that it has revolutionised the corporate sector and forced law firms to innovate, forcing them to recognise that they need change. If you innovate faster, you can build better relationships with clients and ultimately that affects profits and client experience”
The time saving benefits of Exizent alone have exceeded all expectations, with savings being seen across the board. As Jack and Julie continue to use Exizent and take part in the user feedback process, they are confident the platform will continue to evolve with their departmental needs and bring with it a wealth of benefits to their firm.