In the modern law firm, lawyers are commonly expected to work on their own Word documents. However, what if there was a more efficient way? This blog post explores the benefits of outsourcing legal document production and highlights why relying solely on Microsoft Word may not be enough.
At OutSec, we understand the importance of legal documents as fundamental components of deals and client relationships. With decades of experience in law firms and the legal sector, we specialise in providing efficient document production solutions.
Outsourcing the heavy-lifting of document production can yield several advantages for law firms:
1. Time Saving for Lawyers:
Lawyers spending extensive hours on document creation that an expert technician can complete in a fraction of the time can prove costly. Outsourcing saves valuable lawyer time, freeing them to handle other pressing matters.
2. Time Saving for Personal Assistants:
Increased responsibility and a high workload make it difficult for personal assistants (PAs) to allocate time for legal document work. Outsourcing document production allows PAs to focus on their core responsibilities.
3. Cost Savings:
Many modern law firms operate on fixed fee structures. Avoiding significant fee write-offs due to excessive time spent on documents becomes crucial for financial well-being.
4. Expertise Guarantee:
Document technicians possess the skills and experience necessary to handle legal document tasks professionally and efficiently.
How Can OutSec Help?
All you need in life is a perfectly formatted document to enable you to get the job done and done quickly! Whether that is an order form, an invoice, a file note, a meeting note, a letterhead or a report. Simply, having a document technician could be what you need to ensure that your document works; how you want it to work. A professional document production technician will be able to look at your current document and suggest amendments and upgrades to it. They will therefore be able to provide you with a new template that works for your business today.
OutSec takes pride in its team of highly skilled document technicians. They possess intricate knowledge of Microsoft Word functionality, including lesser-known but critical features.
By outsourcing your legal documents to OutSec, you ensure consistent and automated formatting. Our technicians thoroughly review each document, identifying issues such as inconsistent information and typos. This attention to detail helps prevent errors that can be easily overlooked by tired lawyers reviewing complex documents repeatedly.
Our document technicians are adept at spotting and rectifying formatting errors that may cause problems in future document versions. Furthermore, we can assist in creating professional client presentations and documents incorporating tables, charts, and summaries.
At OutSec, we understand the sensitivity and confidentiality of legal work. Stringent security protocols are in place to safeguard your documents and provide peace of mind.
Whether you require assistance with specific documents, need a comprehensive reformat and automation of your precedent bank, or wish to outsource your document production services, our customised solutions are designed to meet your needs.
To explore your options and discuss how we can optimise your legal document production, please contact us today.
Standard Documents, Precedents & Templates
Are you using the same document precedent over and over again? Do you copy and paste standard paragraphs into your documents?
If you do, then creating a standard template document could well be what you need. It will help improve the consistency and quality of the documents produced by your business. It will also save you time and therefore help improve productivity.
Sometimes, all you just is a fresh pair of eyes to see what works for your business today. A document specialist can help you do just that.
Word Formatting
Are you having issues with your Microsoft Word® document? Are you struggling to fix automatic numbering so it runs sequentially? You are not alone!
Table of contents, internal cross-referencing, fields and hyperlinking. These are all features of advanced document production. For some, simple document production tasks such as automatic numbering, tabulation and section breaks can prove difficult.
In a recent survey for “The Lawyer”, these challenges affecting legal professionals were documented:
“Some 30 per cent of survey respondents stated that they frequently find applying numbering challenging. Meanwhile, 29 per cent frequently find it challenging to ensure indentations are currently aligned…and almost 25 per cent frequently find it challenging to update a document to a house style”.
Document templates should be easy for all to use. This is even more so the case for those with basic Word skills. Templates should also be easy for collaborators whether in-house or third party. If document users and collaborators struggle to apply your house style, then it clearly does not work. A house style needs to match the skill set that will use it to ensure successful document production. The same applies also to features like automatic numbering, cross-referencing and tables of contents.
The last thing you want is a document going to another user or collaborator, the document being amended and coming back to you broken. You want them to have a document they can collaborate on successfully and for the formatting to stay intact. The last thing your organisation needs is the expense and time of documents coming back from third parties and requiring them to be fixed.
This is where a document production technician can help.
Version Control
Staff Handbooks, HR documents, business policy documents, and operational handbooks should be strictly controlled. Therefore, document version control practices here are often necessary, together with some form of document protection.
Document version control management helps your business keep all its important files controlled. It makes sure everyone knows which version is the latest and can save time as:
- Employees do not need to waste time opening each version of a document to work out which is the latest version.
- Employees avoid accidentally working on older documents.
As well as coming up with a file naming convention, a document technician would also ensure that your documents contain a document version control coversheet, so anyone accessing the file at the start would see the version they were viewing was the correct one.
For printed material, version control numbering could also appear on each page of a document.
Again, here is where a document specialist could provide advice and assistance on the best way forward depending on your use case scenario.
Portable Document Format (PDF)
The benefit of PDF files are they work on all devices. However, sometimes you may need to convert a PDF to Word as you need to:
• create an editable copy of the original physical document for reuse or repurpose
• create editable sections of text from the original physical document(s) for reuse or repurpose
Alternatively, you may wish to create a PDF from Word to send to someone who may have a copy of Microsoft Word®. Again these are all areas where a document specialist can assist.
Conversion from PDF to Word
Surprisingly, not all PDFs are created equally. Whilst some documents in PDF format, enable files to be converted to Microsoft Word©, some do not. This is especially true where image files of a text document have been placed into a PDF. This can also occur when files have been scanned using older scanners.
Where they do convert, the issue here is that often the formatting from the original document is rarely kept. Sometimes Word uses optical character recognition (OCR) to change the PDF to text. Where text has been poorly scanned in a document, it can mean that sometimes text can look like gobbledegook either in whole or part of the converted Word document. It can also mean that some words may not have been picked up correctly and inaccuracies occur.
So having produced a converted Word version of a PDF document is all good and well. To make it useable is a whole different ball game. Sometimes, it can be quicker for a copy typist to retype the document, than actually try and sort out what has been produced from file conversion.
PDF documents which are protected cannot be converted unless you have a password.
Again, a professional document specialist can inspect your document and give you an idea of how to best proceed.
Conversion from Word to PDF
A document specialist can also format Word documents so that they can be converted into PDF documents too. So if you need a Word document converted into PDF, they can advise you on the best ways to structure documents to get the best out of the PDF format.
PDF Forms
PDF forms are a great way to collect data from a customer or client that you need. Therefore a document specialist would be able to help you create a PDF fillable form.
So what are the advantages of having PDF fillable forms:
1. User Interaction: Unlike traditional paper-based forms which are often a headache to complete by hand, our PDF fillable forms are convenient and offer a broad range of user interactivity. Whether using automated calendars controls to select the proper date or radio buttons, drop-down lists, or checkboxes to provide an answer to a question, you’re likely to find our PDF forms to be far superior to paper forms for many modern transactions.
2. Graphic Precision: Because our forms solutions are built around Adobe PDF, you can rest assured your electronic forms will look exactly as they should on various computer platforms. So there’s no need to compromise on typography, form layout, or graphic quality when using our forms. We will ensure your form’s layout, formatting, and images all remain intact according to your existing paper form design.
3. Data Handling: One of the features that make our fillable forms so special is the ability to efficiently process & manage raw data. Our PDF Forms make it possible to import structured data into your forms (from a data file or database), as well as export properly formatted data from your forms (to a data file or database).
A document specialist can create professional PDF forms using Adobe Acrobat Pro.
Copy Typing
We know there are times when people prefer to draft documents or handwrite notes, and then require a copy to be typed at a later date. Similarly, there are times in this modern world when copy typing of a document (or parts thereof) is needed. This is especially so when a document is in a different format than needed, locked from editing or copying. Or where the document exists solely in a physical form and where an editable, digital version is needed.
There are also times when you have a physical document and need a digital version with some minor changes, where it is quicker and easier to send it to a professional copy typing document specialist leaving you to get on with your day-to-day work.
About OutSec
OutSec is the UK’s leading online transcription company whose business has grown substantially since 2002. We are one of the most successful transcription companies in the United Kingdom.
OutSec provides secure outsourced transcription services to the medical, legal, property and surveying, universities, media and interviews, advisory boards, conferences & seminars, inventories, financial, corporate, HR, recruitment and Executive Search sectors.
Why is Dictation More Efficient than Typing?
Well, the simple fact is that we can all speak considerably faster than we can physically type:
“The average person types between 38 and 40 words per minute”.
A “good rate of speech ranges between 140 -160 words per minute.”
In other words, dictation is up to four times faster than we can type. Therefore, simply dictating a document is more cost-efficient, giving you more time to dedicate your efforts elsewhere in your business.
Therefore why not add OutSec as a business continuity option for your business? Accounts are free, you pay on a per-minute basis (rounded to the nearest minute) on a pay-as-you-go basis, with no contracts or minimum spend. What do you have to lose? Why not open an account today!
Picture Attribution:
Image by storyset on Freepik
