Product Review Soluno: Law Firm Accounting and Billing Software Built with Decades of Experience

By Chelsey Lambert

‍October 12, 2018

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From the team that created PCLaw, Devlos Software Inc. was created; Alan Tuback was the Director of Product Management and his partner Doug Dagworthy was the lead architect for PCLaw. Between them and their team they have over 100 years of PCLaw and legal market experience.  With the traditional players in the market not modernizing the legacy products, they saw an opportunity to bring a second generation Time, Billing, and Accounting solution for law firms to market. After three years of development, Soluno was released in October of 2017.

Soluno speaks to the complex needs of firms that have used premised based tools by offering a cloud or server-based option. Flexible licensing plans, free data conversions, and a customer focused approach makes the switch affordable and attractive.

Overview

When speaking to Alan about Soluno’s ideal client, he explained that their experience in the marketplace has proven mid-sized to large law firms are not looking for an all-in-one practice management solution. Soluno sticks to its time, billing and accounting strengths and integrates with other best of breed products to provide law firms with a complete solution.  Soluno is designed to scale from solos to very large firms with a sweet spot of thirty-five attorneys or “time-keepers”.

Cloud or Premise Based

Soluno is flexible to whatever your IT requirements might be. While many firms are leaning towards Soluno’s cloud-based solution, you have the option to host in your own environment – either on your own server or using another cloud provider.

Time and Billing

The product has a clean and simple design and is optimized for repetitive tasks.  Navigation is intuitive with streamlined user flows. Complex tasks such as split billing, split payments, and trust accounting are effortless.  Soluno covers all the basics, with time, expense, and check recording. For law firms that use external software to track time/expenses, Soluno’s drag-and-drop feature enables users to easily import their data. Each entry automatically flows to the billing and general ledger system, following the “one-write” philosophy. A comprehensive list of active views/reports allow you to the user to get a complete picture of their firm’s productivity and profitability.

Accounting and Tax Compliance

Like PCLaw, Soluno supports multiple trust accounts and adheres to the strictest regulations. This makes Soluno unique amongst Cloud solutions. This removes a major obstacle to firms that want to benefit from a modern solution but feel stuck with their current legacy system.

Comprehensive financial statements are included, so integration with another package like QuickBooks is unnecessary – saving both money and time. Three-way bank reconciliations with bank feed support aids in end-of-month activities.

For jurisdictions with tax requirements, Soluno allows users to record, bill, and track tax information.  For Canadian law firms, the HST journal might just be the best on the market.

Integrations/Security

Soluno’s built-in “document lite” capabilities might be good for some law firms, but for firms that require advanced document management, they provide an integration with Net Documents®.  At the time of this writing the Devlos team are at various stages integrating with Office 365®, LawPay®, ClientPay®, Clio®, RocketMatter® and Casepeer®

Soluno provides an open Application Program Interface (API) that allows firms or other vendors to easily access their data to create their own unique solutions.  Comprehensive security is designed with law firms in mind and is enforced through the API so you don’t need to worry about unauthorized access.

All privacy data is stored encrypted at the field level within the SQL database.  This means that attorney-client privileged information has an extra layer of protection against unauthorized access.  However, this also means that all data access has to go through the secure API.

Migration/Conversion

Devlos Software provides free data conversions, if you prepay for 1 year.  This can save a law firm thousands of dollars. Depending on the complexity of the law firm final conversions can be turned around in a matter of days.  They can do this because their conversion team literally has decades of experience.  This experience combined with a certified consultant and/or your bookkeeper means your data migration will be as painless as possible.

Pricing

The pricing model is usage-based versus the commonly used “user” license model. The main difference is that you can record time and entries for Attorneys that won’t interact with the system.  They also offer shared licenses that is great for firms with part-time/occasional staff.  You never get the feeling they are trying to gouge you.  It is more complex to understand, but even a small firm can save hundreds of dollars. Larger firms additionally benefit from their scaled pricing model. There are no hidden costs: their web site includes a pricing calculator showing the available payment plans for complete transparency.

Bonus! Soluno is available for Canadian Law Firms

The Devlos team has a deep understanding of the Canadian market including Transaction Levy, Form 9A, HST, Trust Administration Fee. Special Fees, and Alberta Trust requirements. Your data meets the requirement of Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA)

In Summary

Both US and Canadian law firms can feel secure in selecting Soluno for their time, billing and accounting solutions.  Devlos Software is a young company with years of experience.  Their team, product and pricing shows that they always put the customer first. For law firms that are looking for a stand-alone time, billing and accounting tool Soluno has the depth of capabilities to match the legacy systems you previously used, with the flexibility to run in the environment of your choice.

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