OPSIS News & Info

Martin Leuw, the Group CEO of IRIS, the UK’s largest private software house, and owner of OPSIS has launched a new blog at http://www.irisblogs.co.uk/

Commenting on the blogs launch, he said:

“This decade, more than ever before, technology will be a key point of competitive differentiation for all commercial decision makers in all businesses and in all markets, whereas in the past the firm’s IT strategy, if there was one, has not always underpinned a business strategy, if there was one. They need to be integrated, not dislocated.

This recession has been and will be a Darwinian experience for many businesses and everything will happen faster than ever before. The winners will be those who know where they are going, challenge the “status quo” and look for ways to use technology to do things quicker and more cost effectively than their competitors, whilst significantly improving the customer experience.

This blog is dedicated to those who love to question and its aim will be to stimulate, provoke and encourage feedback and interaction”.

January 13th, 2010 | Tags: Iris, OPSIS News | Category: OPSIS News |  Print This Post |  Email this Post | Leave a comment

Welcome to the Winter issue of OPSIS News!

The Winter Editions of the Ireland and UK newsletters were emailed to our customers last week, but if you missed it or are new to OPSIS you can find the on-line version of the OPSIS Newsletter by clicking the link below……

2009 Winter Edition of OPSIS News

Headlines are as follows:-

• Recent News
• - Lexcel Precedent Packs
• Latest Releases
• - SCM V5.4.7
• - MA 5.77.1
• Additional Services & Upcoming Workshops
• - NEW PC INSTALLATION/ SERVER MIGRATION
• - CONSULTANCY OR MANAGED DAYS
• - WORKSHOPS
• - CPD POINTS
• OPSIS Support Resources
• VAT Changes

You are also welcome to send feedback to us about any of the articles contained in the Newsletter. Just use the feedback form found at the bottom of the newsletter pages.

January 7th, 2010 | Category: OPSIS News |  Print This Post |  Email this Post | Leave a comment

OPSIS recently provided information relating to the 1st January VAT Rate changes and what needed to be done in our flagship products Millennium Accounts and Solicitor Case Manager.

The Law Society recently announced they have updated their Practice Notes in advance of the return of the VAT rate to 17.5 per cent on 1 January 2010.

The notes advise on charging the correct rate of VAT on the services you make both before or after 1 January 2010 and how to deal with those services that you started before but completed after the rate change.

Some queries have been raised by law firms to the Law Society in relation to paragraph 7.1 of the Practice Notes, and whilst the Law Society are seeking to clarify the position with HMRC Stamp Taxes and HMRC VAT you should refrain from making claims for repayments of SDLT. This will be resolved in the new year.

This does not currently involve any further changes in OPSIS products.

Click here to read the Law Society news article

January 6th, 2010 | Tags: Law Society, OPSIS Support, VAT | Category: OPSIS News, OPSIS Support |  Print This Post |  Email this Post | Leave a comment

The key to better efficiency and increased productivity from your legal case management system is in the setup.

We understand that in a busy office environment it can be difficult for the supervisors to devote the time to setting up Work Types, Case Plans and Legal Precedents.

With this in mind, we are in the process of putting together new Starter Packs for the majority of legal practice work types. These will be pre-programmed with Case Types, Key Case Details, Contact Types, Reminders and a full set of precedents.

We have put together work-flows that will generate the correct letters and documents for each stage of the case and reminders will ensure that nothing is overlooked. This means cases can easily be followed from start to finish, even for those users who are not familiar with this type of work.

We are nearing completion of these new Precedent Packs for NI and we hope to have them available for purchase early 2010.

We are aiming to mirror the same Precedent Packs in ROI and a further update will be provided at the Republic of Ireland seminar in January.

January 6th, 2010 | Tags: Legal Precedents, NI, ROI | Category: OPSIS News, Resources |  Print This Post |  Email this Post | Leave a comment

LEXCEL PRECEDENT PACK - Northern Ireland

Lexcel is the Law Society’s practice management standard. It is a scheme for any type of practice to certify that certain standards have been met following independent assessment.

The Lexcel practice management standard is only awarded to solicitors who meet the highest management and customer care standards. Lexcel accredited practices undergo rigorous independent assessment every year to ensure they meet required standards of excellence in areas such as client care, case management and risk management.

OPSIS have a precedent pack that will give you the Lexcel standard manual.  After inputting a few key staff members in your organisation, the manual will be created with these inclusions.

Please contact our Ireland offices if you would like to learn more about the Lexcel precedent pack.

January 6th, 2010 | Tags: Legal Precedents, NI, OPSIS Sales | Category: OPSIS News |  Print This Post |  Email this Post | Leave a comment

A hot topic for OPSIS customers discussed in the Republic of Ireland seminar last month was Professional Indemnity Insurance.

For those of you who are perhaps concerned that you are not familiar with certain areas of your Case Management or Millennium Accounts systems which might assist you if you were to be assessed etc., please do not hesitate to contact us in order to avail of a “managed day” on site with PII in mind so that we can assess the areas which are perhaps not used sufficiently or not at all and we can outline a training program for all staff or alternatively your Supervisor users who in turn can train all staff.

If you are would like copies of the Professional Indemnity Insurance flyers provided at the seminar you can also download these here (contact us for login/password);

• PII-Flyer-Pg-1.doc
• PII-Flyer-Pg-2.doc

January 6th, 2010 | Tags: OPSIS News, ROI, Training | Category: OPSIS News |  Print This Post |  Email this Post | Leave a comment

SEMINARS - Northern Ireland

As announced in a previous post, a product seminar took place in Belfast on 2nd December when 43 of our northern customers attended for a successful event.

Presentations of where IRIS Legal and OPSIS is currently and where we are headed took place highlighting changes to our software, a demo of the latest versions of Solicitor Case Manager and Millennium Accounts and a positive Q & A session took place.

A similar seminar will take place in Dublin early in the New Year for our Republic of Ireland customers and you will be notified of the date and venue accordingly.

OPSIS intend to hold more User Group meetings in the Spring of 2010 in order get your feedback on the future versions of Solicitor Case Manager and Millennium Accounts.

Minutes from the Seminar can be downloaded here (please contact us for login/password).

If you are would like copies of the Professional Indemnity Insurance flyers provided at the seminar you can also download these here (contact us for login/password);

• PII-Flyer-Pg-1.doc
• PII-Flyer-Pg-2.doc

January 5th, 2010 | Tags: NI, OPSIS News, User Group | Category: OPSIS News, User Group |  Print This Post |  Email this Post | Leave a comment

Version 5.4.7 of Solicitor Case Manager has been released and is accompanied by Release Notes available from the Case Manager Resources section of the website.

SCM 5.4.7

Please read the Release Notes to determine if this release will be useful to you and contact the Helpdesk to arrange your upgrade to SCM V5.4 Release 7.

Please note that depending on the release you currently have, additional time will need to be allocated for the upgrade and enhancements training may be necessary and might incur a fee.

The previously announced release was 5.4.4, and the following intermediate revisions include:-

• 5.4.7: A number of bug fixes in the following areas; Hearings, Diary Manager, Conflict Search print, Weblink indicator
• 5.4.6: Allocate Scanned Documents
• 5.4.6: Case documents owner
• 5.4.6: Excel reporting
• 5.4.6: SMS Server settings
• 5.4.6: Precedents - deleting UD Fields, merge fields check
• 5.4.6: Client/Case Search Fee Earner selection
• 5.4.6: Time Recording changes
• 5.4.6: Email & Diary - Case Email - Incoming and Outgoing
• 5.4.6: Outlook Integration for non-Exchange/Diary Manager
• 5.4.6: Forms handling changes
• 5.4.6: AML Module; CDD Checks, Training records
• 5.4.6: A variety of bug fixes.
• 5.4.5: General: Case Activities Tasks & Hearings
• 5.4.5: General: Case Court Details and general case details, Search, User Record
• 5.4.5: General: Reports new functionality, user logins/logouts, security report
• 5.4.5: General: Case contacts Email
• 5.4.5: General: Case - Release Case Locks
• 5.4.5: Excel reporting
• 5.4.5: Feature permissions; AML and system.
• 5.4.5: LMS Stars
• 5.4.5: A variety of bug fixes.

January 5th, 2010 | Tags: OPSIS Support, Releases, SCM | Category: OPSIS Support, Releases |  Print This Post |  Email this Post | Leave a comment

Millennium Accounts V5.77.1

The Millennium Accounts release of 5.77.1 is now available.

This release has one change from 5.77.0.

The LSC Bulk Load has been adjusted to correctly identify VAT on Counsel Fees.

This issue may be useful for any Legal Aid customers who do Immigration Work including Vatable Counsel disbursements.

As this is an intermediate version release the database itself does not need upgrading from 5.77.0, only the programs on users computers.

For more information, release notes and downloads of the latest Millennium Accounts software go to our website Legal Aid Announcement support page.

December 18th, 2009 | Tags: Legal Aid, Millennium, OPSIS Support, Releases | Category: Legal Aid, OPSIS Support, Releases |  Print This Post |  Email this Post | Leave a comment