Technology has rapidly changed the printing needs within law firms

AS A lawyer, well-organised documentation can make a world of difference to your professional life. Document production – the hold-all phrase for hardcopy print, copy and scanning services – within the legal industry requires a higher degree of accuracy and attention to detail than most: the ramifications of mistakes are high. Long gone are the days when you just clicked ‘Print’.

A lot of contemporary file types, intended only for use on screen, require purpose-built software to render them to a printable format. In a data-driven environment – where we see an average of 189.2 billion emails sent worldwide daily – the tools required to print such files have had to advance in order to keep up.

The explosion of data brings with it many challenges across resources, time and accuracy. Print rooms have to be able to respond to the demands of review teams, who are juggling several considerations and imperatives. Good print rooms anticipate and offer solutions.

They should be able to assist by ordering the material exactly how you want it, but they should also be able to de-duplicate at a family or document level, winnowing the material for you, cutting down review time and eliminating unnecessary cost. They should have access to early case assessment tools, which can drive powerful keyword searches and isolate only the material you need.

Well-equipped print rooms should have a number of contemporary high-volume production machines, each capable of printing between 105 and 120 pages per minute – that’s six or seven thousand single sided black and white pages per hour – which reduces the lead time necessary for planning complex print jobs.

If your print room is buckling under pressure, finding a service provider that understands the pressures of the legal services industry and can meet a client’s needs is essential. The right mix of hardware, software, planning and know-how is now required to successfully complete what used to be reasonably simple tasks. As technology advances, that mix will become harder to get right.

Nathan Jarvis is the Operations Manager at Law In Order.  For more information visit www.lawinorder.com.au

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