Maintaining accurate records of your law firm’s accounts is a complex but vital part of running a law firm. By simplifying your firm’s accounting and bookkeeping workflows, you will stay compliant with ethics rules, protect sensitive client information, and monitor your cash flow effectively.
The benefits of legal accounting software multiply with today’s cloud-based solutions. Cloud-based accounting software is accessible anywhere, requires no maintenance costs and doesn’t require time-consuming updates like on-premise software.
Zil Money’s accounting software for law firms that use the cloud is automatically updated and backed up and offers unparalleled insight into your firm’s financial data.
Legal Accounting Software Features
Looking for a legal accounting software comparison but not knowing what to look for? Below are some features law firms should consider:
Books And Records
You have to be meticulous and accurate when keeping track of financial transactions and accounts. Automating your firm’s bookkeeping tasks using legal accounting software can help you maintain more accurate records with less effort.
Monitoring Time
The accuracy of law firm billing and, ultimately, profitability depends on capturing every minute of billable time. Using QuickBooks with Zil Money, legal professionals can benefit from practical and easy-to-use time-tracking features.
Trust Accounting
Compliance with trust accounting is essential for law firms. Furthermore, you can generate compliant invoices, generate the necessary reports, and reconcile your accounts in seconds with Zil Money.
Unique PUN
A unique Payer Unit Number (PUN) is created to process ACH payments. The details are not stored online. The broker can use the PUN for only particular statements.
The Billing System
If you have legal accounting software with billing features (such as creating or tracking invoices) or that integrates with your practice management software, you can streamline your workflows.
Payments Made Online
A majority of consumers (66%) expect to pay for legal services online, according to the 2021 Legal Trends Report. According to these statistics, clients prefer to use software that securely accepts online credit card transactions. You can also streamline your collections and accounting workflows with online payment solutions like Zil Money.
Payroll System
Regardless of how big or small your firm is, accurate, timely payroll is a must-but it can be time-consuming to handle manually. Payroll automation can help you with this. Consider accounting software that integrates payroll functionality with time and expense tracking apps. For greater efficiency, you can also generate pay runs with the click of a button with Zil Money.
Contributions To Government
There are many ways that legal accounting software can assist with taxes. Accounting software is often used to prepare taxes, or legal accounting software is essential for keeping accurate records necessary at tax time. In addition, many online accounting tools can generate useful online tax reports.
Financial Statements
Your firm’s financial performance is essential to its success and growth. However, creating financial reports manually is time-consuming. It’s easy to create reports with online legal accounting software, regardless of whether you need them for sales, expenses, taxes, or other metrics. Some report customization options are available to help you focus on what matters most to you.
Consolidation Of Statements
Verify your financial data more efficiently with accounting features that simplify reconciliations (including three-way trust account reconciliations).
Managing Clients
Zil Money’s accounting software integrates a client relationship management (CRM) system that saves your firm’s staff time and streamlines workflows.
A Guide To Evaluating Law Firm Accounting Software
Implementing legal accounting software is a big decision for your firm. As a concept, cloud-based accounting offers clear advantages, but not all law firm accounting software is the same. Below are a few considerations:
Assess Your Law Firm’s Accounting Needs
While different legal accounting software options offer different features, that doesn’t mean you need every single one. Select an option based on what features are most useful to you and avoid those that are a deal-breaker.
Consider The User
You should choose user-friendly software to meet the needs of those who use it the most at your firm. Your firm’s users require more technical support when learning a new tool, so look for options that are easy to use and offer personalized customer support.
When it comes to law firm accounting software, cloud-based solutions are better than premise-based ones because they’re more flexible, offer more robust security, and are more scalable. With Zil money’s cloud-based solutions, you can work efficiently from anywhere and integrate with other cloud-based services to streamline your accounting processes while always remaining up-to-date.
Analyze Your Existing Tech Stack And Workflow
Your goal should be to find a legal accounting solution that complements and enhances your existing tech stack. When you implement law firm accounting software, think about how you will manage specific workflows. Can this accounting software integrate with your case management, time tracking, trust accounting, billing, payments, payroll, and other vital aspects of running your firm?
A legal practice management system that integrates with accounting software can be beneficial in this context.
What Type Of Financial Data Do You Need?
You can use Zil Money’s law firm accounting software to help you stay compliant with trust accounting or create custom reports to help guide business decisions. Not all products will have all the features you need. Identify your needs and choose an accounting system suited for them.
Protecting Your Data
You are responsible for protecting client data, including information stored or processed by your legal accounting software. Therefore, it’s critical to check the security features of any potential solution.
Make Use Of Zil Money’s Law Firm Software.
Specifically, law firms are subject to billing, trust accounting, and more specific accounting requirements. The advantages of law firm-specific accounting software are far more significant than general accounting software. Find accounting software that is specific to your legal practice.
