It also decided to replace its standalone analogue dictation system with a state-of-the-art streamlined digital dictation system from BigHand, a global leader in voice productivity for professional service firms. 

Cowell Clarke offers a broad swathe of legal services encompassing litigation, insolvency, construction, defamation, property, corporate and commercial and environment. The firm has 60 fee earners and 14 partners who had in the past used hand held dictation devices loaded with tapes which had to be physically delivered to a secretary for transcription. 

As partner Rob Comazzetto explains, while the firm is based in Adelaide, it provides legal services around Australia and on occasion, internationally. While the analogue tape system was limping along in the home office, when partners travelled its flaws were magnified. 

“There were workarounds – people would dictate onto their iPhone then email that file and the secretary would try to transcribe it,” he says. 

But there was no visibility into the process and even in Adelaide, there’s always the risk of a tape being mislaid. 

Comazzetto heads the firm’s insolvency and reconstruction and competition law sections – and has also taken on the responsibility for its technology refresh. 

Having looked at a series of different digital dictation solutions, he identified the BigHand solution as the best fit, and it was implemented in September. 

To boost efficiency and reduce the risk that arose from lost tapes Comazzetto recommended Cowell Clarke provide all fee earners with an iPhone loaded with BigHand’s app to support digital dictation. This meant they only had one device to carry, and could also automatically send dictations back to the office for transcription regardless of their location. 

Once a file note, memo or letter is dictated the voice file is sent immediately to the BigHand server in the Adelaide office, which manages workflow according to the priorities assigned to the voice file by the lawyer. Any backlogs or bottlenecks in the transcription process are transparent to the secretarial team which can reassign transcription jobs on the fly. 

“It’s easy to pick up the work from BigHand workflow,” says Comazzetto, adding that this also ensures that dictations out of the office or overseas are automatically routed for transcription. “This makes it so much more useful.”

Cowell Clarke has also integrated the BigHand system with its time charging application, Mitimes. When a lawyer starts a dictation they are prompted to enter a description and matter number which then ensures that the time taken to dictate a letter or file note is automatically noted on the lawyer’s time sheets.

Comazzetto said the firm did not opt for speech recognition mainly due to just concentrating on making the transition from analogue to digital. Comazzetto stated that the voice recognition module was definitely on the firm’s short term roadmap.