In today's issue of TechnoLawyer NewsWire, lawyer and legal technology legend Dennis Kennedy covers software for managing client trust and escrow accounts, online sticky notes, and a free service for sending files too large to email. Don't miss the next issue.
Below you'll find one of the three articles from today's edition:
Stop Losing Sleep Over Client Trust Accounting
By Dennis Kennedy
A surprisingly large percentage of disbarments and disciplinary actions against lawyers arise out of the mishandling of client trust funds. The rules for handling trust funds can seem arcane — especially for bookkeepers and accountants not experienced with law office trust accounting and ethical rules. To make matters worse, many general business accounting programs either do not handle trust accounting or provide only rudimentary or limited options.
Easy Soft's Easy Trust software enables you to take charge of your firm's trust and escrow accounting needs, and comply with the applicable rules in your jurisdiction. Easy Trust can track and reconcile receipts and disbursements for each of your clients separately while providing tight controls and an audit trail.
Thanks to a "simple, elegant interface," you can easily set up client ledger cards and enter transactions. You can create as many bank accounts or client ledger cards you need. Most importantly, Easy Trust prevents common trust accounting mistakes from occurring. For example, by default it guards against client ledgers having a negative balance.
Easy Trust also provides security and control. You can set up an account for each user with its own set of permissions limiting what that person can do in the program (e.g., transaction "entry only" permission without the ability to "print checks" or perform "bank reconciliation"). Other helpful features include overdraft alerts, bank reconciliation, and three-way reconciliation.
Easy Trust generates a variety of useful reports designed to simplify the audit and review process. For example, you can view the prior month's reconciliation reports, enabling you to easily match the reports with the corresponding bank statements. Various bank and client ledger reports can be produced with a single click. Also, users of Easy Soft's Easy HUD RESPA program can import settlement transactions directly from HUD-1 forms.
Easy Trust costs $499. Licenses for additional computers cost $199 each. Learn more about Easy Trust.
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