Legal firm improves client service with network digital dictation system

T Cryan and Co is an independent firm of solicitors based in Harrow, North London. Established in 1976, the company was originally created by Tom Cryan. The practice works with private clients and legally aided clients and offers a range of legal services including personal injury claims, family law, housing law, criminal law and conveyancing (both residential and commercial cases).

The Challenge - Embracing the digital age

Clive Lucas, who joined the company in 1983 is now the sole proprietor of the firm, which employs 20 staff based at the Harrow office.

With over 30 years operating in the Harrow area, the firm has built up a strong reputation for providing a high quality service based on personal recommendation and referrals. The firm’s high street location also ensures a regular flow of prospective clients.

As an independent firm operating in a competitive market place, service levels are critical to the continued success of the business. With this in mind, T Cryan recently introduced WinScribe Digital Dictation system to improve operational efficiency and provide greater levels of service to their existing and future clients.

Getting started
Previously the legal team relied on an analogue tape-based system for all their dictation needs. When solicitors were working remotely they would send their dictation tapes through the post, to be picked up the next day by their secretary.

“We needed a reliable dictation solution that would enable us to manage documents more effectively” explains Julie Collins, Practice Manager, T Cryan and Co. “With the tape-based system it was difficult to keep track of which documents were waiting to be transcribed, which meant tapes would often be out of date by the time the secretaries came to transcribe them. Also tapes could easily be wiped by mistake and sometimes a tape would be lost in the post. We needed something that would help us deliver a more reliable and efficient service.”

Senior partner Clive Lucas tasked Julie with searching for a suitable dictation company. After carrying out an extensive search online, WinScribe’s website proved to be the most impressive and led to an introductory meeting between the two parties.


The Solution – WinScribe

“WinScribe MD, Philip Vian, gave us a detailed presentation of the WinScribe system and how the technology could benefit our business. His level of knowledge, expertise and professionalism helped to the clinch the deal. There was no need to look elsewhere,” continues Julie.A new network dictation system was successfully installed in April. The WinScribe system is currently used by 15 members of staff, consisting of 8 fee earners and 7 secretaries, with the option to train a further 3 administration staff at a later date.

The Result - Maximising the Room to Grow

For those solicitors who spend the majority of their time based at court, the WinScribe system has proved invaluable. Previously solicitors would dictate remotely and send the tapes to the office for secretaries to transcribe.
However since the WinScribe system has been installed, solicitors can now dictate remotely using their hand held recorder and transfer the data to the Winscribe server via an individual docking station connected to their home pc. The encrypted dictation is stored on the central server, waiting transcription from the office based secretarial team.

The inbuilt flexibility of the WinScribe software gives solicitors the option of allocating the document/letter for transcription to a particular secretary according to their experience, or alternatively allowing the system to automatically allocate jobs to the next available transcriber.

Previously, an audio tape would have been sent to a specific secretary with multiple dictation jobs completed by the same person.

With the introduction of the WinScribe system, multiple dictations can be spread amongst the available secretaries rather than building up and producing an overwhelming workload for one individual.

As well as improving office efficiency, the new WinScribe system can now also be accessed remotely by secretaries based offsite. Two former office based secretaries are now enjoying the benefits of remote working due to the flexibility of the WinScribe technology.

“The sophistication of the technology ensures that our secretaries can log in remotely and access the WinScribe server to download the documents awaiting transcription,” continued Julie. “Our secretaries also have remote access to the client files, so once the job is complete, the transcribed document can be copied straight into the relevant client file and sent to the printer, so the appropriate solicitor can pick up the document as soon as it is completed or the following morning if necessary. This has improved the whole document management workflow process enormously and enabled us to provide a quicker turnaround for our clients”.

Managing workloads
Transcribers can access the WinScribe system to view what jobs have been allocated to them, as well as the jobs waiting to be completed in the general typing queue. The system also allows them to view the length of the dictation and the deadline for its completion.

The WinScribe system also allows transcribers to alter the speed of the dictation making it easier to understand words and suit their typing speed. Transcribers can also access business document templates, such as sample letters, invoices or reports, which are downloaded from the WinScribe server, improving the efficiency of the transcription process.

“The WinScribe system has allowed us to manage the workload more effectively. As well as all the extra features which make transcription easier, the flexibility of the system means we avoid incurring any downtime if staff are absent. For example if someone is off sick we can move the work around easily and still meet our internal deadlines” explains Julie.

The system was installed by legal IT specialist LAN Support, over the course of two days. “We were already familiar with LAN Support, as they provide our hardware and software support,” says Julie.

Julie continues, “By coincidence, we discovered LAN Support had recently started working with WinScribe as a sales partner so when the WinScribe server was being installed it made things much easier as they were already familiar with our systems.”

The majority of the installation work affected just one computer which hosted the central server, ensuring minimal disruption to the day to day running of the office and client servicing.

“After initial training, staff were impressed with the user friendly nature of the system and would not be without it now”, says Julie.

Following the successful installation of the digital dictation network, there are further plans to introduce WinScribe’s speech recognition software in July this year. “We are very grateful to WinScribe for their continued support and are confident that the roll out of the speech recognition will be just as successful as the digital dictation network. The amount of time saved, increased flexibility and efficiency throughout the Firm is incredible,” concluded Julie.

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