The legal profession in the United States is not immune to the changes revolutionizing commerce through the Internet.  Industries as varied as banking, insurance, travel, brokerage firms, and even the retailers have been forced to change the way they do business.

The scope of these changes should not be underestimated, for they have the potential to manifestly transform the provision of legal services in the U.S. not only the segment that serves the broad middle class, but large corporate law firms that serve corporations and financial institutions. The impact of the Internet on the practice of law has drawn national attention by the American Bar Association (ABA), state bar associations, the media, and at one point the venture capital community.  See for example: http://www.elawyering.org - the ABA ELawyering web site.

Law firms are beginning to use the Internet as a platform for delivering legal services to their clients.  Innovative law firms are learning how to add an "elawyering" dimension to their practices, increasing client satisfaction, access to the legal system, and law productivity at the same time.

The Current Market: "The Shrinking Pie"

Small Law Firms.  

The legal services profession has never been at the leading edge of technology adoption.  There is an oversupply of attorneys in the U.S., caused by the unregulated production of attorneys by U.S. law schools.  As a result, there is price competition which contracts law firm profit margins.  Certain areas of personal service law, such as domestic relations, are witnessing a dramatic increase in the number of individuals who represent themselves by filing pro se. The increase in pro se representation is a direct result of the the failure of smaller law firms to respond to the needs of consumers in terms of price, service delivery, and approach.  Self-help legal web sites continue to proliferate at an astonishing pace, in all substantive areas that affect the middle class. 

Personal injury litigation firms are also under pressure because of no-fault insurance. Plaintiff's litigation firms in areas such as medical malpractice, mass torts, and shareholder derivative suits are sectors that are still doing well, but even these practice areas are being targeted for legislative reform.

Medium and Large Law Firms. 

Law firms that primarily serve corporate clients are also under increasing price pressure caused by a mature market for medium and large size law firms. Consolidation or liquidation of large law firms will continue, and corporate legal departments will gravitate to the most efficient law firms for routine work.  Increasingly, corporate legal departments will seek transparent relationships with the law firms that serve them, requesting access to information on case status and billings in real time, access to the knowledge base of law firms directly in order to reduce duplication of legal work and legal billings, and virtual environments for deal-making and complex litigation.

"Unbundling Legal Services" as a New Way to Deliver Legal Services.

There is a renewed interest in the concept of "unbundling legal services" as a way of reaching moderate income clients who are underserved by the legal profession.  The idea of delivering legal services as discrete and limited tasks for a fixed price, instead of by the billable hour, is certainly not new and has been practiced by some law firms for many years.  Recently, Forrest Mosten, a divorce mediator based in a California, has written a manual on how law firms can deliver unbundled legal services. The American Bar Association has several task forces and committees working on making recommendations to state ethical governing bodies to revise their rules to enable further unbundling of legal services.  Several years ago a major conference was sponsored on this topic by various groups within the ABA.

Much of this discussion has focused on organizing a typical office practice into discrete services, bundled into the context of an office practice.  In fact, because of its capacity to deliver highly targeted services to a discrete group of clients, the Internet will become the platform of choice for powering the concept of an unbundled law practice.  Because the Internet is a narrow-cast medium, it can work its magic on the delivery of digital legal applications, reaching just the client base that the law firm wants to reach at the time when the client is ready to be approached.  Once serviced by these digital applications, the law firm can build the trust that leads to the wider delivery of legal services to the same client base.  For law firms that are seeking to build market share at the expense of other law firms in competitive markets, the Internet can provide just the leverage that the aggressive law firm needs to expand its services to other markets, both geographic and substantive.

Epoq US,  has developed a law firm-specific Internet technology platform that supports the deliver of legal services over the Internet.  Following are the digital components of a competitive strategy that powers the next generation of law firm web sites: client-centered web sites that provide the client with their own secure and personal web space where they can manage their legal affairs; web-enabled document automation tied to law firm workflow processes; rich legal content derived from the law firm's knowledge base; virtual environments for collaboration, communication, and conflict resolution; legal information and advice engines that generate standardized answers to client's frequently asked questions and manage the provision of further legal advice and consultation; ROI calculators to help clients make informed judgments on whether to pursue a particular piece of litigation and/or decide which course of action to pursue.

If you are interested in learning more about our approach to delivering "unbundled legal services" over the Internet through a web-enabled law firm site, click here for more information about Epoq's new web service package for solos and small law firms.  We are searching for law firms that serve consumers and small business and are interested in incorporating web delivery of legal services as an integral part of their law practice.  Our theory is that empowerment of a group of law firms with web-enabled digital technologies will give them a competitive advantage and enable them to increase their market share to the point where both the law firm can benefit over time.

Our law firm licensing program either adds our technologies to your existing web site or results in the creation of a new web site that is client-centered and web-enabled.  Here are examples of such web sites:

http://www.mdfamilylawyer.com

http://www.mdbankruptcylaw.com

http://www.dcselfhelplaw.com

For more information on our unique licensing approach, please complete our Inquiry Form, and we will promptly contact you.