Bruce Godfrey

R.I.P. Amira Milad

Last week I learned of the passing of Amira Milad, an IT administrator in a medium-sized law firm where I worked for many years in Pikesville. That firm and I severed ties some years ago, but I recall Amira warmly for her decency and generosity with her time on many technical issues that can arise in a working law office.  My condolences to her family and loved ones. R.I.P.

Posted by Bruce Godfrey in Godfrey-personal, News, 0 comments

Latest Marketing Scam from Speakeasy Marketing

Who would have guessed that a marketing shop called “Speakeasy Marketing” would involve something shady?

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My response:

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Posted by Bruce Godfrey in Practice of Law, 0 comments

Friolo v. Frankel: 14 years of Maryland litigation and still going strong

Friolo sued Frankel under the Maryland wage payment and collection statute, and the rest has been 14 years of trial and appellate history, including the appointment of a special master and three trips to Maryland’s highest court.  A lot of the fighting has dealt with attorneys’ fees, specifically the reasonableness of requested fee-shifting under Md. Code Ann., Labor and Employment article, §3-507.2.

From the very recent opinion of Judge Wilner, specially assigned to this case after his retirement, I give you the first paragraph and last sentence thereof.

“This case is making its third appearance in this Court, having visited the Court of Special Appeals twice and having occupied the attention of the Circuit Court for Montgomery County on three occasions, one of which involved two separate proceedings. Like Kaufman and Hart’s man who came to dinner, it is wearing out its welcome….

“We would admonish Friolo and Goldsmith [ed. Plaintiff’s counsel] to be mindful of the risks of excessively gilding the lily and suggest to both parties that it is not too late to negotiate a settlement.”

For those poorly formed in the American theatrical tradition such as myself, this is a link to Wikipedia’s entry on The Man Who Came to Dinner.  Since I have no culture, I probably would have gone with Groundhog Day.

Posted by Bruce Godfrey in Employment Law, Maryland law - general, Practice of Law, 0 comments

Top 10 things I wish that Clio (goclio.com) would add to its program

As I have discussed elsewhere, I am a big fan of Clio practice management software for law firms.  I have often wished that I had something analogous to manage non-professional household projects, though Evernote comes close.  Especially since Clio made a major upgrade to its management of escrow accounts as few years ago (allowing exclusion of obsolete closed/zero files from escrow account reports), it’s been a pleasure to use.

Here’s  my “wish list” for Clio next iterations.

  1. Quick access to all of a specific client’s bills within a matter record.
  2. A tickler function allowing one to cycle through all open matters gracefully; we should “check in” periodically on all files of course and a cycle/tickler function would facilitate, say, a monthly check in. Some firms might welcome for their associates a “hard lock” function requiring the attorney to put a status update comment in every open matter every month before it will let the attorney do anything else, unless waived by someone with admin-level privileges.
  3. Escrow account and operating account checkbook-style reconciliation tools, with reconciliation reports that track what we need to track to report the “iron” triple reconciliation requirement: Sum of client balances = House Balance = Bank Balance, with allowed adjustments for bank fee money and uncleared transfers.  If Clio does this, I think they can reasonably charge an additional $10/month or more.
  4. A tool for joining matters for joint representation, or allowing data to be entered into multiple records at once, for instances where joint representation is the case (and, to my mentees, ethically approved with informed consent confirmed in writing.)
  5. Some add-on/plug-in allowing for back emails from, say, Gmail for search and forwarding into a matter’s record (e.g. all emails regarding Quartermaine to be forwarded into 00325-Quartermaine.)
  6. Tracking of non-client matters (example: Bar Association projects, key vendors, etc.) under a separate client numbering system.
  7. Changing the names of some labels.  For example, one can enter “Activities” and also enter “Time”; both allow the entry of billable events, but you might get the idea that they are different things.  Similarly the use of the misleading term “fees” for all debits from escrow are of concern; some debits from escrow better NOT be for fees. In short, a revamp of the labels for some items for User Interface optimization.
  8. The ability to enter in full contact info for a new matter immediately.  Perhaps a minor point, but it’s a little inefficient to have to enter in a new client’s name when creating a new matter only to have to enter in the address and phone number in a second iteration.
  9. A field in the new matters interface for the identity of the referral source, ideally with a tickler item for a thank you note and/or ethically approved work-share/fee-share terms under Rule 1.5.
  10. An option for an auto-reminder from closed files say, one year after closure, for follow-up letters, greetings, renewal of corporate annual minutes.  While other ways exist to handle this, this might be a helpful tool as an optional global setting.

Anything (within law, ethics and good prudence) that helps lawyers make more money, save more time and comply with ethical requirements more easily should be on the table. All of the foregoing aid the attorney on one of those three broad goals.

I am a pushy bastard of a customer; anything that affects my clients’ rights or trust money is a big deal with me. To its credit, Clio continues to innovate; this week it is launching a new billing platform and is marketing itself heavily on its ability to save attorneys time through its “what would you do with your #Clioday” [extra free day per week saved]”. Clio is clearly a company willing to innovate with its product and it’s been a pleasure watching over the last two years how the company has tightened and improved its platform. I don’t assume that any of these suggestions would be implemented at Clio, but if a couple of them made it into the platform over the next 2 years it would be great.

Posted by Bruce Godfrey in Practice of Law, 2 comments