22
December

E-Lawyering: SaaS Jurisdictional Customization

by Matthew Pitts

Yesterday I briefly touched on the importance of jurisdictional specific SaaS (Software as Service) solutions. The reasons are obvious. The laws in each jurisdiction are vast and changing. A one-size-fits-all solution is not practical nor is it efficient. In addition, utilizing a jurisdiction-specific solution protects against interstate UPL (unauthorized practice of law) situations.

Staying local is smart

Confining your legal service delivery (via Saas or other e-lawyering methods) to a local (likely statewide) area is the smart thing to do. First, you are likely a very capable legal professional who  realizes the intricacies of a particular area of law in your jurisdiction. Next, it just makes sense.

An example of a localized E-Lawyering feature

At some point during the legal service delivery pipeline, whether online or otherwise, the client will need a court hearing. This hearing may be a motion hearing or a full blown trial. Nonetheless, the local rules will need to be consulted when selecting a court date. The following example is a very simple loo k at a calendar system that reads the client's county and displays hearing times based on the local rules of that county. 

This example is not pretty and it is scaled way down. In a real application, we would implicitly interpret the client's county and display only the relevant motion information. In addition, the application would know what kind of hearing was necessary based on previously gathered information.

Like all of the examples in my blog posts, this one also has very limited functionality. If the example stops working, refresh your web browser.

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Comments

12/26/2009 3:01:22 PM #

Richard Granat

Can you elaborate further on what you mean by a jurisdiction specific SaaS Service?

Richard Granat |

12/26/2009 4:00:35 PM #

MatthewPitts

Sure. SaaS solutions specifically geared toward online delivery of legal services must, in my opinion, be customized for the relevant jurisdiction. For instance, a family law attorney utilizing an SaaS solution for delivering family law legal services online would need a solution tailored to the state in which they practice law.

Of course, this applies to the more complex SaaS solutions that I envision for the future. The depth of the intelligence and logic in the applications will reflect that of the particular area of law in a particular jurisdiction.

Broader, more generic areas of law may be able to use a more standardized approach. In addition, legal advice and other a la carte legal services may be able to utilize a non-jurisdiction-specific solution.

MatthewPitts |

Published in De Novo

Be sure to read my article in the December 2009 edition of the Washington Young Lawyer's Division publication De Novo. You can read it here.

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Matthew A.Pitts

About Matthew A. Pitts

 I am a freelance paralegal in Washington State. I have experience in multiple areas of law in both the private and the public sector. Legal Web Development and Marketing

For the past 7 years I have focused on legal marketing and legal web design and development. I have professional level web programming and design skills.

About this Blog

 The legal service delivery landscape is changing rapidly. Despite the number of options available for legal professionals to establish a web presence and begin to engage in some type of "e-lawyering", there are core fundamentals required for success. In this blog I intend to thoroughly cover these fundamentals. Please subscribe today.

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