Setting up your Auto-Text Entries in Amicus Attorney 7

By Chris Arrendale

A new feature in Amicus Attorney 7 is the ability to add Auto-Text entries inside of the program. Team members can use these Auto-Text entries to quickly insert frequently used words or phrases. This is a great feature for team members creating time entries or for simply adding a quick note to the file. To start utilizing this great new feature, follow these steps:

1. Go into the Main Office Screen and select Preferences on the left side of the Amicus Attorney screen.
2. Select Spell Check under the My Application Section
   
   
   
   
3. Make sure that the box is checked for Amicus Attorney to automatically expand the text based on the Auto-Text settings. To access the Auto-Text entries, click the button labeled "My Auto-Text" toward the bottom of the screen.
   
   
   
   
4. You will then see all of the defaults that Amicus Attorney has placed in the database. To delete any of the entries that are currently in your Auto-Text list, highlight the entry and click the Delete button at the bottom of your screen. You can add to this list by entering your shortcut in the "Expand List" text box and then entering the expanded text in the "To This" text box. After you are done, click OK and then Apply. You will then be ready to use these Auto-Text entries inside of Amicus Attorney.
   
   
   

Bio: Chris L. Arrendale is the Director of Technology of Best Law Firm Consultants as well as a certified law office software consultant. Chris received his BA in Political Science and Sociology from Emory University. He received his MS in Software Engineering and Information Technology from Southern Polytechnic State University (Magna Cum Laude). Chris is a Microsoft Certified Desktop Support Technician, Microsoft Certified Professional, Microsoft Office Specialist, and holds other certifications in Windows Server 2003, Computer Help Desk Support, Microsoft XP, Office XP, PC Master Technician, NT Administrator, Networking Technician, Information Security, E-Commerce, Wireless Concepts, Internet Technology, and Webmaster. Chris is also an active member of the Association of Computing & Machinery, as well as the IEEE. He has many years of experience working in a law firm environment and consults on hardware, software, trial presentation, network, security, wireless, and handheld needs. He is also a certified consultant/trainer on Amicus Attorney, Amicus Accounting, PCLaw, Worldox, Workshare Professional, CompuLaw, ActiveWords, Adobe Acrobat, and is an authorized reseller of Word Perfect, Microsoft Word, and Backupmybusiness.com.

Amicus Attorney 7 Customization

We're proud to remind everyone that Amicus Attorney 7 boasts the most comprehensive (and easy-to-use) customization capabilities on the market.

Customization allows you to track whatever types of information you want within the context of your practice management. The benefit of this is that you can make Amicus Attorney into a highly specialized system for the specific areas you practice and the exact way in which you like to work.

To do this, Amicus Attorney provides both custom fields and custom records, with the latter being a powerful new feature in version 7's Premium Edition. Custom fields allow you to add individual pieces of information to a file or person. Custom records allow you to add lists of information. Each item in the list can contain as many fields as you want and there can be an unlimited number of items in the list.

For example, a litigator might define a custom field called "Court Action No." Normally there is only one such number per matter, so there is only one such field per file. But if that litigator wants to track an injured plaintiff's medical expenses, she cannot know in advance whether there will be one item or 100. And each expense has many elements, including things like its date, amount, reason, doctor prescriptions and more. The litigator would like the ability to review a history of all these expenses, sort it in various ways, plus see a running total. Custom records can do this easily; custom fields on their own cannot do it at all. Thus custom records add a significant new dimension to practice management.

With custom records, Amicus Attorney can track any additional type of information required by your particular practice - with the possibility for complete new practice systems built on the framework of Amicus Attorney. The significant advantage of custom records is that these specialized practice systems are fully integrated into Amicus Attorney.

• All of the tools of Amicus Attorney are available with them
• They can be cross-referenced to other Amicus Attorney information
• They appear in the context of other standard information about the file or contact
• They make workflow much more natural than if you tracked them in a separate system
• They are subject to the access control systems in Amicus Attorney
• They are easy to create and can be reused on every file of the same type

Amicus Attorney's custom records take advantage of the full range of custom field types, including look-ups (e.g., People or File cross-references), text, numeric, graphic, date, time, currency, percentage and many more. They also take advantage of custom field properties (e.g., specifying that a given item is required when a record is created). You can have unlimited fields per record. List and detail views are provided for each record type. Use total fields across lists of custom records for calculations. Custom records can be seen on a specific file type, on contact records, or on both files and contacts.

Custom records utilize a powerful and easy-to-use drag-and-drop form designer, so that not only can you track exactly what you want, but you can also have it look exactly the way you want. Better yet, it is so easy to use that anyone in your firm can set them up.

Use them for the entire firm, a given practice area, or just for the specialized needs of a single case. The possibilities are endless.

Question: After enabling e-mail integration in Amicus Attorney 7, where do my e-mail messages appear in the program?

Answer: In Amicus Attorney 7, you can now view e-mails via three tabs within the Communications module. The tabs are called Outstanding, Today and Outlook. Here are some more specific details on each tab, along with conditions to be met or the requirements needed to view your e-mail:

The Outlook Tab

This tab shows the contents of your Outlook mailboxes - it literally embeds Outlook with Amicus. It offers all the usual navigation and file structures that you see in Outlook (inbox, drafts, sent items, etc.) Each e-mail item can be quickly associated with a file or contact thanks to the convenient Amicus buttons on the left side of the screen. Handy information:

• This tab will appear under the Communications module after enabling e-mail integration and restarting your Amicus Attorney 7 workstation. A message: "You will need to restart Amicus Attorney before this change will take effect" will prompt you to do so.
• All e-mails can be viewed within the Outlook tab. This will show the same tree structure as you have within your Microsoft Office Outlook.

The Outstanding Tab

This tab displays a list of incoming/outgoing e-mails that have been saved into Amicus but that you have not yet finished dealing with. You also have the option of seeing incoming/outgoing messages and calls. Important information on this tab:

• While any e-mail could show up here if it was manually saved, to be auto-saved the e-mail address must make a unique match to an Amicus contact (i.e., if you have two different contacts with John@firmname.com as an e-mail address, when an e-mail arrives from this address it cannot be auto-saved, as the application cannot arbitrarily decide which contact to associate the e-mail).
• Auto-saved e-mail that is marked outstanding is normally incoming, While items in Outlook's Sent Items are auto-saved as well, they are set to “dealt with” and as such, are not considered outstanding.
• E-mail shown here will be within the range in which to show outstanding e-mails (as per the preference setting, default setting is 45 days, i.e., an e-mail from three months ago, that is in your Inbox and matches uniquely still would not show).

  Note: If you reply to an item within Amicus, its status becomes “dealt with” and the item is removed from the Outstanding list. The sent item is also saved; however, as it is a “sent item,” it is also automatically set to “dealt with” and hence does not appear in the Outstanding list (although it is saved).

The Today Tab

This tab shows all incoming/outgoing e-mails, calls and messages that have taken place today, whether or not they have been marked “dealt with.” A handy list to review when doing your time entries at the end of the day!

In Addition To The Tabs

E-mails associated with People or Files can always be found in Communications Brad, as well as within the Chronology (regardless of dealt with or outstanding status). And by using the Search tool, saved e-mails can always be searched and found, regardless of the dealt-with status or the date.

Amicus Attorney Premier Consultants are professionals who are nationally qualified to sell and install all Amicus Attorney products and provide their customers with on-site training and support.

Training Programs Offered by our Premier Consultants:

Here are a few of the training sessions offered by some of our Premier Consultants. For more information or to register for a class, please contact the consultant firm directly. All times listed in ET unless otherwise indicated.

CD-ROM TRAINING

2b1, Inc.
San Francisco, CA
415-284-2221
www.2b1inc.com

Amicus Attorney V Basic Training: PC Desktop training for the Amicus Attorney user. Easy-to use and easy-to-follow animation covers the most popular features of Amicus Attorney V. For more information, visit their web site: www.2b1inc.com/t_products.htm

ONLINE TRAINING

ProBill Law Firm Solutions
Boca Raton, FL
800-299-9177
www.probill.net
administration@probill.net

For more information, contact ProBill Law Firm Solutions via e-mail or phone.