Many industries are moving toward paperless operations by digitizing records and workflows. However, in the legal industry, you still need some documents in print format. For example, you may need to print a legal contract or court submission for your clients.
While printing for legal business, you may often experience some issues. So, it is essential to keep your printing equipment and software up to date. It is because relying on an outdated system can cost you time, money, and also cause security issues.
In this blog, we will explore the major challenges that legal businesses face in printing and discuss how to address them.
Many firms upgrade their technologies for other areas, but they overlook printing. But you shouldn't do the same. An outdated system can create security gaps and slow down your legal printing operations. It can also increase your printing costs.
If you are using a shared office printer, then you can see documents left sitting in the output tray. It can be a serious issue for your law business because it can lead to compliance violations.
Research shows that in the U.S., 14% of printed documents are left out on the printer tray. Employees often forgot to pick them up or got distracted before collecting them. This can leave confidential information exposed to anyone passing by.
This security issue can be solved by using secure pull-printing and authentication protocols. With these system, you can only allow authorized users to enter a PIN or scans a badge at the device.
By following this way, you can protect your sensitive data and create an audit trail. In the future, you can verify who had access to your printing zone if any privacy concerns arise.
Printing is a billable expense, and you can recover that cost from clients. But you can struggle to recover that cost without accurate tracking. Losing track of bill back usage per case or per attorney can result in lost revenue.
An updated system can help you track printing costs and client chargebacks effectively. It will also increase your transparency to the clients. Since they will be able to see the detailed records of billable expenses.
It is essential to know how printing happens in your office to protect confidential information. Many firms lack centralized tracking for this. As a result, it becomes hard for them to identify printing waste and encourage responsible printing behavior.
With managed print service, you gain visibility into print habits across your organization. These tools help you establish clear policies and reduce unnecessary usage. The dashboard aligns your print environment with firmwide efficiency goals.
Legacy printers can have frequent paper jams, toner shortages, and slow output. All these technical issues can impact your productivity. The staff can often get disappointed and fail to submit the client deliverables on time. So you must replace outdated machines to ensure an efficient legal printing operation.
Legal documents are valuable, and their privacy matters. It is difficult to know where those documents end up without monitoring and control. It can lead to major compliance issues for law firms. It is essential to establish secure print policies and utilize digital archiving tools to mitigate this risk.
Providing technical support can be challenging when different vendors supply your printing equipment. It can take time to repair the equipment, and the cost of troubleshooting also increases. So you need to streamline your print environment under one legal print partner. It will reduce troubleshooting complexity and minimize maintenance issues. This will also give you a unified experience across all locations.
Managing printing across departments and offices can be difficult for law firms. There are always some issues that need to be solved, such as toner outages or billing confusion. This is why many firms turn to Managed Print Services(MPS).
With MPS, you gain predictable costs through flat-fee or per-page models. According to Gartner, organizations can cut printing costs by up to 30% with a managed service. That kind of visibility helps you plan budgets more effectively.
Usherwood has long experience in helping law firms modernize their printing systems. Our managed print services can make your printing operation fast, secure, and cost-effective.
A law business should be very thoughtful about choosing a Managed Service Provider. There are confidential documents that you will need to handle in your firm. Sometimes, you need high-volume printing, so a cost-effective solution is necessary. Before selecting a partner, ensure that they understand the unique needs of your business.
Here are some guidelines that you can use to choose a managed print service for your firm:
In the legal industry, protecting the privacy of client matters the most. Pull-printing is a system that allows only authorized users to print documents. The risk of leaving an important document in the tray can also be reduced in this system. It also creates an auditable trail of who is printing a document.
Law firms need accurate billing for their clients. A good MPS can provide you with cost recovery tools to track usage by case, client, or user. It will help you provide clear records of printing expenses to your clients.
Law firms must manage a large volume of legal documents on behalf of their clients. They can digitize their records to make this task easy. There are several cloud-based document management systems for the law business. These systems can keep sensitive legal documents secure and well-organized.
Sometimes, a printer can malfunction, and you may run out of toner and other necessary parts. In that case, you need a quick solution to meet a tight deadline. So, you need a legal print partner that offers reliable local support and fast delivery of printing parts.
You need to get key data to enhance your printing environment. Therefore, you should utilize updated tools to track who prints, what they print, and how often. These insights can help law firms follow data privacy standards and avoid compliance issues. It will also help you to set policies for creating a more efficient printing environment.
As someone running a law firm, you will often face many printing challenges. But that doesn’t mean you have to slow down your operation for that. All you need to do is learn how to manage your printing service better.
By upgrading your print system and partnering with the right managed print service provider, you can overcome most of the printing problems. Are you having frequent issues with your printing operations? At Usherwood, we have IT experts who can assist you in resolving this issue. Request a free audit today to identify the hidden costs and risks in your printing system.