Amicus Attorney +Abacus Private Cloud: A Winning Combination for the Modern Law Firm
Cloud solutions have been changing the way lawyers practice law for several years now. The benefits of cloud-based systems over on-premises solutions have never been clearer than they have been in the past year, given remote work demands and evolving ways of doing business.
That was certainly the case for Sam Ferruccio, president and senior partner at the Ferruccio Law Firm, a practice that’s been serving the Canton, Ohio, community for nearly 40 years. Ferruccio and his firm offer clients trusted legal representation both inside and outside of the courtroom, in areas such as criminal defense, personal injury, business law, wills and probate and liquor law.
For the past 20 of those 40 years, Ferruccio has been relying on AbacusNext solutions to manage the caseload and serve clients – including Amicus Attorney since 2017. When it came time to make the switch to the cloud, the firm added Abacus Private Cloud to its arsenal. Running Amicus Attorney on Abacus Private Cloud has enabled secure access, streamlined processes and made the task of running a successful small firm infinitely easier.
“I can go to one place for everything.” — Sam Ferruccio, President + Senior Partner
Moving to the Cloud
For nearly every law firm big or small, 2020 was a year of change, and the Ferruccio Law Firm was no exception. The firm unfortunately found its on-premises server dying and, rather than investing the time and money to fix it, decided instead that it was time to make the switch to the cloud. The new realities of working from home reinforced the decision, and the need for a cloud-based, fully managed solution became clear.
Because Ferruccio had two decades’ worth of information already in Amicus systems, it didn’t make any sense to reinvent the wheel by looking elsewhere for a cloud solution. Doing so would not only have been unnecessarily expensive; it would also have been time-consuming and cumbersome, which is not an option while continuing to provide seamless service to clients
A Smooth Transition
The AbacusNext team worked with Ferruccio to skillfully plan and prepare the firm to make the transition to Abacus Private Cloud a success. As Ferruccio explains, everyone on the team was helpful and available when he needed them, and the sales team was instrumental in coordinating the process and making sure no unexpected issues derailed progress. Notably, this in itself was a welcomed partnership.
“The transition was easy and better than I had thought it would be. We didn’t miss a whole lot in the process. It was pretty smooth.”
When staff were dealing with the dying server, “everybody kept trying to figure out what the issues were,” he explains. “For me, an ideal solution is one where I don’t have to have so many IT people coming into my office to fix things all the time.” Ferruccio believed that making the move to Abacus Private Cloud would solve the problem, and he’s been right. The Ferruccio Law Firm has been using Amicus Attorney on Abacus Private Cloud for the past few months, and things have been working great.
“The transition was easy and better than I had thought it would be,” he says. “We didn’t miss a whole lot in the process. It was pretty smooth.” At the end of the day, the AbacusNext team was a huge help in making the project a success.
The Benefits of a New, Cloud-Based System
The Ferruccio Law Firm has been working with AbacusNext for two decades, so the basics of the system were nothing new. What staff did have to get used to, though, was that everything was now in the cloud. At the end of the day, a cloud-based law practice management solution proved to be even better than the system the firm had been used to in the past.
Ferruccio values the increased efficiency, time savings and organization that running Amicus Attorney in Abacus Private Cloud offers. “It’s probably overkill for us because we are a small firm, but it’s a great system,” he says.
Among Ferruccio’s favorite features of the new Amicus Attorney system is the ability to integrate his emails directly with his files. It has made it significantly easier to add contacts and information for people like experts with just a click, rather than a cumbersome process to switch back and forth between applications. While Ferruccio uses the contact and email features the most, his staff have found the system to be invaluable for other functions such as locating names in the system, handling referrals, keeping track of clients and communicating with those clients.
Everyone’s calendars are now synced, and all files can be referenced at any time. Ferruccio uses Amicus Attorney on Abacus Private Cloud across the entire firm. Simply put, “it’s the organization – I can go to one place for everything,” he says.
In the past with on-premises systems, the firm could never know for sure that its updates were being done without constantly having to monitor the situation. Now no one has to wonder – updates are done automatically, without Ferruccio or his staff having to do anything.
“I would absolutely recommend working with AbacusNext, Amicus Attorney and Abacus Private Cloud,” Ferruccio concludes. “I have turned a lot of people on to the product over the years. We’ll continue to utilize all the capability built into the system.” Even better? “The IT folks haven’t been back since,” he says.