Year: 2016
Legal Web Watch October 2016: The need for technological competence
This article first appeared in Legal Web Watch October 2016. Legal Web Watch is a free email service which complements the Internet Newsletter for Lawyers. To receive Legal Web Watch regularly sign up here. Across the pond, in 2012, the American Bar Association formally approved a change to their Model Rules of Professional Conduct to […]
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Delia’s legal web picks September 2016
This article first appeared in Legal Web Watch October 2016. Legal Web Watch is a free email service which complements the Internet Newsletter for Lawyers. To receive Legal Web Watch regularly sign up here. The following items have been selected from Delia Venables’ “New” page. What can conveyancers do in a fragile property market? Improving […]
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What can conveyancers do in a fragile property market?
It is widely reported that due to the increase in government taxes on buy-to-let landlords in April coupled with the uncertainty created by the Brexit vote in June this year, the British housing market is under significant pressure. According to the British Bankers’ Association, the number of homes that were bought in June were down […]
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Why the legal industry shouldn’t wait for QASA
As reported in Legal Futures, the much delayed Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates (QASA) – originally scheduled for implementation in December 2011 – is still showing no sign of movement. QASA has been described as “the only way” to protect all members of the public involved in criminal proceedings “at an upper level” but has […]
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Changes to CPD
The era of traditional CPD “points” requirements for both solicitors and barristers is drawing to a close, with new continuing practice development regimes being introduced for the next practice year. Whilst there has been plenty of notice of this (for solicitors, not so much for barristers), it’s understandable that many practitioners, particularly those operating without […]
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Confidently confidential
This article considers two recent developments relating to data protection and trade secrets: two sides of the same coin perhaps. Cloud computing and extra-territoriality The first development concerns the recent spat between the United States and Microsoft, not as previously an issue of antitrust compliance, but rather a question of privacy and data protection in […]
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Chatbots for customer service
Does your law firm find call handling a challenge? Do you sometimes find yourself losing out on leads because your fee earners do not have enough time to follow up on enquiries? Many solicitors struggle to find the time to respond effectively to new enquiries while still managing their workloads, especially when many of these […]
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IT security for barristers
Although written for barristers, the recommendations below would broadly apply to any lawyer practising without the support of an IT team. As a practising barrister, your working life is probably busy, hectic and mentally exhausting, and the thought of having to consider the security of your IT equipment is more than likely not one that […]
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Cloud-based software for lawyers
There are a large number of companies offering legal software to lawyers – around 100 at my last count. The software section of my website www.venables.co.uk/software.htm lists and describes them all, A to Z. As well as the A to Z sections, I now provide a section called “Cloud, Outsourcing and Hosted Systems” at www.venables.co.uk/outsourcing.htm. More […]
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Introducing the GDPR
Towards the end of 2015, the EU institutions reached agreement on a new General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) which will replace the 1995 Data Protection Directive, seeking to implement a stricter and more harmonised data privacy regime. The new GDPR, which was published in the Official Journal of the European Union on 4 May 2016 […]
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New e-learning tools and blended learning
It is time for legal practices to introduce more effective and comprehensive training, not just for lawyers, but for management and support staff too. In this article I explore why and how you might introduce a structured blend of training across your practice that includes more affordable and manageable e-learning alongside traditional face-to-face training. More […]
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Changes to AdWords
In February of this year Google made a substantial change to the way it inserts some advertisements into the search results when searching from a desktop computer. The advertisements on the right hand side of the screen, known as the “rail”, have all been removed. And Google now serves up to four text ads above […]
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