Peter Baverstock discusses the best ways of building a healthy, profitable conveyancing practice.
The orderly transfer of the ownership of land is one of the cornerstones of our society. For most of us, purchasing a home is the largest investment we will make in our lives. Due to the lack of familiarity with the process and the real and perceived risks, buyers rely on their trusted solicitor to represent them.
However, as conveyancing has commoditised the conveyancer needs to do more work for less money and as a result many small law firms are surrendering conveyancing work to conveyancing ‘shops’. This needn’t be the case.
The key is how quickly and accurately you carry out the work itself. Through the introduction of great technology you can make residential conveyancing profitable a sophisticated case management software system would allow your firm to:
Access a library of ‘automated’ and up to date legal forms
A good system should will allow you to incorporate your own correspondence into the software so that you and your staff produce every document, for every matter, in the same way. This standardisation will bring quality and efficiency.
Benefit from integrated searching
Order all your searches and have results returned directly to and from the matter and the cost of the search debited against the matter ledger, turn transactions around faster; provide your clients with detailed costs relating to the searches and dramatically reduce the cost of the administrative work.
Ordering all your property searches including the Land Registry, AP1s and SDLT from one provider will completely automate the conveyancing process.
Communicate efficiently with your client
With fixed fee work, unnecessary phone calls eat into your profit margins, avoid concerned calls by keeping your client well informed. A good system allows you to:
- Locate matter correspondence in an instant and with ease;
- Integrate your email with your case management software allowing you to send and receive emails directly from the matter;
- Send your client a ‘pack’ of documents, create a composite pdf of those documents, in the correct order, so that it is easy for your client to understand.
Market your conveyancing services
The market is intensely competitive. Most people do their research online before making a purchasing decision, even if they have received a recommendation. If you don’t have a great website that clearly sets out the services you offer and the value that your firm will add to the process, then you are losing work to the firms that do.
In conclusion, most buyers prefer to deal with their local trusted lawyer for their conveyancing needs. As a small law firm owner profitability comes with building your conveyancing practice and the best way to do this is through utilising the best technology available.
Learn more about building a healthy conveyancing practice. Download your free whitepaper from http://info.leap.co.uk/whitepaperTC today.
About the author
Peter Baverstock is the Chief Executive Officer of LEAP UK. Peter has spent many years developing and delivering software and legal content to lawyers in small firms. LEAP is a privately owned supplier of software and content to small law firms. www.leap.co.uk
This article was submitted to be published by LEAP Legal Software as part of their advertising agreement with Today’s Conveyancer. The views expressed in this article are those of the submitter and not those of Today’s Conveyancer.
