So, we’ve gone paperless- almost.  We’ve got our computer, printer, and scanner. But, now we have to address the software we need to accomplish our goal.

The first piece we need is PDF software.  We actually use a variety of programs.  Adobe Acrobat is the standard- but you should note that this software is about to go subscription, so get your copy soon, before it becomes an annual cost. [ed note:  AFTER this was published- Adobe just announced that it will continue to sell Acrobat; it’s other products will be subscription only.]  Adobe Acrobat lets us set the properties to preclude changes, allow them to be protected with a password, stop anyone from printing a specific document, redact a document, effect OCR (optical character recognition), plus add notes, stamps, highlight, or type onto the document.

Lawyers will enjoy the automatic Bates Numbering feature (Advanced pane>Document Processing>Bates Numbering>Add)- and you can place that number in the center, right, left, even in the header or footer.  Everyone should know that you can add headers or footers to any document (Documents>Header & Footer).   Bookmarking makes it easy to progress though a document- it’s critical for tax documents, medical documents, research reports, FDA submissions, depositions, and the like.  (Side panel- left side; if you click on a bookmark, you jump to that section of the document.)

You can also stamp the document- with any of the conventional stamps Adobe provides (confidential, faxed, etc.)- or any jpg image you wish to make into a stamp.  You can also redact the documents.  You can make them obtrusive (like the “government” redactions you see on TV or the movies- in bold black blocks-  or  have them whited out (less obvious).  (There are times when redacted information must be proven to be viable redactions; that’s great because you can just “un-redact” them to show what was removed.)

We use Microsoft Office- because we are addicted to Outlook (which synchronizes with PCLaw) and lets us set up appointments- finding open times for everyone- with ease.  But, OpenOffice programs exist- especially for those not wedded to Outlook or Access.  You will need one of these sorts to type your documents, prepare your mathematical or financial analyses, track data, make presentations, or custom-made thank-you cards.

And, once you have chosen to save these outputs as PDF formats, the documents can be rendered to be available everywhere.  We use Microsoft Sharepoint to make our output available, which lets us set various security levels, share with clients, etc.  But, most of our clients don’t share- they use Evernote, Dropbox, or SkyDrive.  (There are others, but these are among the best.)   All of these devices (storage on the internet or cloud) can synchronize among more than one computer.

You notice that I did NOT include those document processing and preparation programs that work over the web.  Because, we often work on airplanes, in cars, in buses, or foreign countries where we don’t have access to the internet.  And, if we made those sorts of choices, we couldn’t prepare our work in any location we needed.

So, now what?  All I have to do is scan every piece of paper that comes over the transom right?  Yes- but no.  First, you have to do that scanning immediately- so it is indeed readily available.  Second, you need a naming convention for each of these documents.  (Note that the naming of Office documents can- and should- have a different protocol. )

[I also believe you need an indexing system.  One that will let you find your document in a heartbeat.  We have a favorite- but, since we make money from its sale, I won’t mention it here.  You should find one that works for you.]

When you scan your documents, you can spend a lot of time naming each of them.  That usually works for a day, a week, or maybe a month.  And, then, folks give up on that system.  I vote that your name them as YYYYMMDD.xyz,   so that they are always in chronological order.   I also find that most of our clients fail to continue with the xyz (description) if things get busy, which is why the indexing program is so critical.  (Our scanner system appends numbers to the ends of the document name, which is not very descriptive either.  A nest of folders (for client matters, bills, etc.) is critical, as well.)

The issue is when a letter or a bill comes in- there needs to be a tracking system.  To insure that someone responds to the letter or processes the bill!   (We suggest using Remember the Milk- or Omnifocus, if you are an exclusive Mac facility; most of our clients are not in that category.)

Each document that needs action is added to the task list and emailed to the appropriate person.

Now, we have the outgoing paper- or internal documents.  You can save these the way you normally do- in the same digital nest described above.  Many of our clients use the Office (Word, Excel) documents as “work documents” and save each document as PDF (or print to PDF), which makes it archival.   (Our problem is finding the most recent version of the “work” document if you need to make revisions.)  There is no need to use paper to print the document and then scan it into your system.

Of course, this brings up your letterhead.  We recommend that you prepare a digital letterhead template – with footers and headers, as required. (You can do the same thing for your envelopes!)

It also helps to have a “blank digital folder”- one you can use to set up your file system for each of your new clients and/or projects.  This way you can just copy that folder (in our case, that folder is called 000Client, which means the copy is called 000Client2), which is then renamed with the proper client attributes.

Our client file system is simple.  The main file is DoeJohn (MatterName).  Under that primary folder, we have invoices, temporary files (Word, Excel, etc. files) , permanent files (the pdf versions of files and scanned documents), and then some specialized files (like Taxes and years, for those accounting clients).

So, when will you be going paperless?