Growing Accountancy Practice Opts for Hosted Digital Dictation

James & Co selects nFlow solution for flexibility, mobility and customer service

nFlow, a leading supplier of digital dictation and voice productivity solutions to the accountancy sector, today announced that James & Co, a Kent-based accountancy practice, has implemented nFlowLive.com, a Cloud-based Dictation-as-a-Service (DaaS) solution. nFlowLive.com has replaced the incumbent analogue tape-based dictation system at the firm. James & Co chose nFlowLive.com for its superior Cloud-based Digital Dictation technology, ease of deployment, intuitive use and customer support. The firm undertook a rigorous trial of the solution prior to selecting nFlowLive.com.

Today, fee-earners and administrative staff at the firm are able to access transcriptions and dictations from any geographic location, greatly facilitating flexible and mobile working. The fee-earners are also able to use nFlowLive.com as an instructional messaging tool. For instance, dictations can be accompanied with express guidance on a variety of client deliverables. This, combined with the better workload sharing and work management capability offered by the solution, is contributing towards an enhanced customer service. Previously, all dictation tapes had to be brought in to the office for transcription and a single tape often carried dictations pertaining to more than one client, making prioritisation of work difficult. The possibility of inadvertently deleting recordings along with deterioration in the quality of tapes overtime meant that the firm ran the risk of losing important client records.

James Halligan, Accountant and Tax Specialist at James & Co, commented, “Cloud Computing-based Digital Dictation makes business sense for us. We now have a second generation, enterprise-class Digital Dictation solution, which has required practically no investment to implement. We simply needed a PC and an internet connection to deploy the solution firm-wide. More importantly, it is available to us at a very cost-effective monthly subscription, and we have the opportunity to easily scale the solution in tune with business requirements.

“nFlowLive.com has delivered almost immediate efficiency gains and overall operational flexibility to the business. We are very impressed by nFlow’s exceptional approach to customer service. nFlow treats all its customers alike, irrespective of size, which is refreshing.” Rob Lancashire, Managing Director, nFlow, added, “The accountancy sector has awakened to the benefits of Digital Dictation and opting for the hosted route is perhaps the fastest and most economical implementation for growing practices. nFlowLive.com can be up and running within 24 hours. Especially for fixed-fee businesses, the increased efficiency that it delivers almost instantaneously, positively impacts on their profitability. In addition, we are extending this offering by introducing a Speech Recognition solution within nFlowLive.com, later this year. This will give customers a very advanced Cloud-based Voice Productivity solutions suite, requiring minimal investment.”

Through nFlowLive.com, customers have access to nFlow DDS Version 5.0, the second generation enterprise-class digital dictation system. It offers industry benchmark 99% service availability, a rich client install, secure data backup, disaster recovery and free online user training. Further, customers can designate nFlow to undertake the complete system administration for them on a day-to-day basis.

nFlow Achieves International Success

Leading Norwegian law firm Wikborg Rein selects nFlow Digital Dictation, pioneers use of workflow-based digital dictation in Norway

nFlow, a leading supplier of digital dictation solutions, today announced that Wikborg Rein, one of Norway’s leading law firms, has selected nFlow Version 5.0, the second generation Digital Dictation System (DDS), along with nFlow Mobile for Windows, as its digital dictation solution of choice. Ranked number one in several business sectors in the Legal 500 EMEA listing, the firm has currently purchased licences for its Norwegian sites including Oslo and Bergen.

Prior to sanctioning the deal with nFlow, the firm simultaneously trialled another well established digital dictation solution at its Oslo site to benchmark the functionality and features delivered by Version 5.0. Wikborg Rein chose nFlow based on an overall assessment of the two systems. In addition to existing client support, nFlow has specially set up a Scandinavian and Central European support line to cover Central European office hours.

The solution will greatly enhance staff productivity through more effective remote and mobile working, allow better utilisation of staff resources, and facilitate work sharing amongst administrative staff at the firm. The full implementation will commence imminently.

Sigmund Solås-Johansen, Head of IT, Wikborg Rein, said, “We experienced first-hand the reasons for its widespread adoption during the trial period. nFlow was instantly embraced by both our fee earners and secretarial staff – not just for the immediate efficiency gains it delivered to them, but also for the workflow management part that could even out the workflow between the secretarial staff.”

Being an international law firm, often fee-earners travel abroad for client-related work. During the trial, users experienced the benefits of the nFlow DDS. They were able to turnaround documents such as meeting notes, legal paperwork and correspondence within hours as well as send instructional messages to office assistants instantly. They simply recorded their dictation from any geographical location and sent it to their office in Bergen for typing with express guidelines on level of urgency, type of documentation along with additional instructions as necessary to meet client deadlines and expectations. For instance, a solicitor visiting a client abroad was able to deliver notes from a meeting within an hour, in time for the next meeting with the same client for which the notes were required.

Rob Lancashire, Sales and Marketing Director at nFlow, commented, “We understand the legal business and the time pressures that fee-earners and secretarial staff have to deal with. These are universal, irrespective of region. Our solution is designed to enable firms to meet these administrative challenges, crucially freeing up valuable time for the more important fee earning activity. Further, internationally spread organisations can easily overcome issues caused by time differences across the geographies they conduct business in.

“We are delighted to be working with such a reputable firm. We look forward to a mutually beneficial partnership with Wikborg Rein.”

nFlow has been shortlisted for ‘Best Small IT Supplier of the Year’ category of the prestigious BCS & Computing UK IT Industry Awards 2009 – Organisational Excellence. It is the only digital dictation software developer ever to be shortlisted for this award.

nFlow Digital Dictation Chosen Firmwide By Dickinson Manser

nFlow, a leading supplier of digital dictation solutions today announced that Dickinson Manser, a leading South Coast law firm and a member of the Law Group UK, has completed the rollout of nFlow Digital Dictation System (DDS) as their solution of choice. nFlow was selected following a review of the market, leading its rivals on cost, functionality and all round approach, particularly in a thin client environment. The project involved nFlow working with a number of 3rd parties including Tikit who provide Dickinson Manser with infrastructure support and Lexis Nexis Axxia, where a joint development project provided a live matter look up integration.

The nFlow project saw the installation of nFlow DDS to 61 users over 2 sites, Poole and Broadstone, with the former requiring installation on standard Windows PCs. The Broadstone site required installation on Citrix with nFlow’s unique local audio repository technology once again demonstrating the systems strength in thin client environments where limited link capacity between offices is an issue. This has resulted in users finding the performance of nFlow DDS in the remote office running on Citrix, to be equally as good as the performance on the PCs in the main office.

The Lexis Nexis Axxia integration provides a live matter look up with the Unix version of Axxia DES using the nFlow universal PMS look up module. This allows fee earners to simply but accurately attach live and validated matter information to each dictation.

Management information and reporting was of importance to the firm so enabling this was an important element of the project. nFlow’s unique reporting data warehouse technology allows Dickinson Manser to store unlimited job data and to interrogate it to gain access to information by any means and at any time.

The nFlow system at Dickinson Manser has also been implemented with nFlow portable device downloader technology providing an effortless download process for all users and a common device independent interface.

The results of Dickinson Manser’s investment in nFlow DDS are already being observed with the firm reporting a 2-3 day backlog having been completely removed and the turnaround time on large documents such as leases being halved. The firm says the ability with nFlow DDS to see work prioritised by both time and document type has empowered secretaries to be a lot more effective with their time.

Jean Kendrick, Dickinson Manser Office Manager commented on the project;” “The project was an ‘unknown’ to my colleagues and I, but I have to say it has all gone very smoothly and we are already recognising the benefits. For example my secretaries will now pick up a short job just before lunch or the end of the day whereas before they would have avoided starting a tape as they just didn’t know what was on it.” Mrs Kendrick continued, “The nFlow team were consistently helpful and supportive throughout the entire implementation process. We are very pleased we installed nFlow, in fact I now don’t know what we would do without it now.’

Rob Lancashire, nFlow Sales & Marketing Director said “Dickinson Manser are another innovative and ambitious regional law firm to choose nFlow DDS. The project was really interesting for nFlow, the technical requirements for the project were high and they drew on our unique technical ability and functionality, particularly in the Citrix environment. The project is a great reflection of how nFlow DDS has been developed to the highest technical standards and ultimately possesses unique functionality that allows firms to fully utilise their Digital Dictation investment whilst maximising the overall benefits and scalability of their infrastructure.”

Digital Dictation Software from nFlow

What is nFlow Digital Dictation Workflow Software?

• A managed system
• Has a controller — often a database
• Handles flow of work to users without needing lots of administration — avoids duplication and conflicts
• Low maintenance
• Simple to run — fire and forget
• Collects data on business processes
• Safe and robust
• Scalable
• Often provided as part of the solution — recognises the importance of dictation as a critical process

Can firms of all sizes benefit from nFlow digital dictation workflow software?

Any firm can benefit from;

Physical process improvements

• No lost or wiped tapes — better security!
• Clear dictation — less errors!
• Dictation immediately available for typing

Business process improvements

• Increased work sharing
• Time management without the effort
• Smaller chunks of work
• Visibility of dictation content type
• Prioritisation
• Cross office resource utilisation

Psychological benefits

• Empowerment of users
• Better information
• Greater control
• Easy workload sharing
• Sense of security

Management benefits

• Indication of activity — Current and Historical
• Staff performance indicator
• Resource requirement indicator
• Client response indicator

I don’t need workflow software. My firm is too small. But does size matter?

• Workflow proven to deliver benefits for as little 5 users
• Cheap products not always as cheap as they seem
• Lack support
• Inflexible generic products
• Much higher administration costs - More hassle
• Beware the salesman spreading doom
• Workflow does not need expensive servers and powerful computers
• Any business of any size can benefit from the flow of information - We all use email!

The commercial arguments for migrating from tapes to digital

• 40% increase in productivity is common
• Save money on tapes and tape machines
• Reduce backlogs
• Increase author to secretary ratios — lower secretarial overheads & Increase profit per sq ft of office space
• Remove need for temps
• Reduce staff turnover / retain good staff
• Improved disaster recovery planning

Proven Results

• Family team in 90 user firm — 8 day backlog to surplus typing resource in just 2 weeks
• 30 user firm — payback in as little as 9 months
• 400 user firm — saving of £150k in overheads in first year
• 28 user firm — 20% reduction in full time secretarial resource overheads
• Litigation team in 65 user firm — removed need & cost of recruiting new secretary
• 22 user firm — now cover all transcription across 3 small offices
• Newly formed 5 user firm — are already growing!

Open up new options for your firm with nFlow digital dictation software

nFlow Digital dictation software is proven to empower a firm to do business more efficiently

• Remote working for Authors & Secretaries — PDAs, Telephones, Citrix, Terminal Services
• Differing secretarial skill levels — simple text typed by non specialist secretaries
• Outsourcing — 360 degree integration between systems
• Integration with other office systems — Microsoft Office & Business Productivity Software
• Management reporting
• Disaster recovery options
• Many more!