US Lawfirms deploy new methods to lower cost

US Lawfirms are increasingly using Legal process offshoring (LPO) to lower the costs of operations. In many cases the cost savings are as much as 40 – 60% as compared to traditional methods. To illustrate an example , an eviction lawyer records the names and addresses of evicted renters from court notices in to a voice activated recorder or an 800 line. Around the time the lawyer retires for the night, an off shore team is able to extract, decode the information and include the names and address into a form letter. The form letter then prints out at a printer in a US location and the notices get mailed out. When the lawyer returns to his office the next day he receives a softcopy of the file along with confirmation of the mailings. All these are accomplished at a fraction of the costs and time. Thanks to technology, low cost of global resources and the time difference between the firm and off shore locations. The services offered by LPO firms are broadly divided into three categories. At the lower end of the spectrum are the traditional paralegal services which comprise of legal billing, contact management, calendar management, time management, developing power point presentations and expense reimbursement. At the next level is the document preparation services which include petitions, responses, summons, disclosures, Financial affidavits , Disclosure, responses to other attorneys and document gathering. At the highest level is legal research and IP research. Legal process outsouring ( LPO) is the latest trend to impact law firms in major developed English speaking countries, the US, the UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. The total addressable market in the US alone is expected to exceed is estimated $ 20 Billion by 2010