March forward confidently
ReadIT! revisits March Solicitors in Newbury, Berkshire, a new firm of family lawyers which has just undergone its first accountant’s report.
“It was a doddle!” exclaims Marc Chaudhuri, “and not just from my point of view. Even my accountants said it was probably the simplest audit they had ever done.” As a user of Pinpoint Interactive since opening his own practice, and never having undergone an audit before, Marc was pleasantly surprised at how straightforward the process was.
He explains, “I went to my accountants’ offices with my laptop that I use for accessing Pinpoint Interactive, clicked on my 3G connection and showed them how it works. Basically I demonstrated how I set up new clients and showed them the client and office ledgers. I had provided all the necessary supporting paperwork together with the requested random selection of client files and we simply worked through the audit together. There were no queries that I couldn’t answer straight away by taking them to a point in the file, in the documentation or physically show the entry on the ledger on my laptop.”
The straightforwardness of the audit was, Marc believes, largely due to how simple Pinpoint Interactive is to use. “Apart from being a very intuitive system to operate, I have a great cashier in Karen Lewin to help me along. I think it’s a testament to the training and guidance I’ve received that, without an in-house cashier, my first audit has passed without one single breach,” he says.
With his first year in practice under his belt, and having stuck to his strategy of outsourcing all his business services including accounting, digital dictation, telephone answering and even using serviced offices for client meetings, Marc firmly believes that this business model will continue to serve the firm well into the future.
“The only changes on the horizon are that I’m about to sign the lease on my own offices and I’m planning to recruit a law graduate to work alongside me,” says Marc, “but I’ll continue to outsource all my office services, even as the firm expands in terms of numbers of people. I want to bring in young, talented, ambitious individuals who are hungry for success and will contribute in a positive way to our clients’ experience of March Solicitors.”
Because he spends much of his time in court and on the move, Marc Chaudhuri, has fully embraced the benefits of today’s mobile technologies. Armed with his laptop and Vodafone Palm he can not only provide the highest level of service to his clients but also attend to all the administrative tasks necessary to the smooth running of the firm no matter where he is.
“I’m absolutely sold on outsourcing,” concludes Marc, “my one regret is that I didn’t come up with the concept of Pinpoint myself – it’s such a brilliant idea.”
Marc Chaudhuri can be contacted via www.marchsolicitors.com
