Legal Wit

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ProDoc Customer Support: Make Payments, Check Your Account Balance, Etc. Online

"Here is another thought, why not "Create" the ability to pay my account, through the ProDoc icon "on line".  Meaning within ProDoc,  I click on "pay my bill" and the amount is automatically withdrawn from my bank account.  When will we get this "service" and have the ability to print a hardcopy of the payment?  Very soon I hope."

This suggestion came to us in December from one of our customers. She must be a mind reader because we just released a new feature on our website that provides a similar option.

You're a ProDoc customer because you embrace efficiency in your practice. So, we realized that not providing you this service was creating inefficiency in your practice—and we set out to correct that oversight on our part. If you have not already done so, we hope you'll take advantage of this new feature to quickly and easily set up automatic monthly payments on your ProDoc account.

You can now go to our website and:

1. View your account balance, view your last payment amount and date, or make a one-time payment.
2. Set up automatic payments for your ProDoc bill using a credit card or checking account.
3. Update your automatic payment information.

Here is how to access this feature:

1. Go to www.prodoc.com.
2. Move your cursor over the new My Account button on the navigation bar.
3. Click on the Online Payment link that is revealed under the My Account button.
4. Follow the instructions on the following page.

Or, click on the My Account button on the navigation bar near the top of this page.

If you have any questions about using this feature, please call our Customer Support team at 800-759-5418. Remember that your ProDoc subscription entitles you to free training and customer support.

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Coming Updates

2008 Planned Enhancements

New Volumes

In the first half of 2008 we intend to release six new volumes comprised of the Judicial Council Forms for these areas of law: Criminal, Conservatorship, Guardianship, Litigation, Juvenile, and Landlord/Tenant. We will also add additional Judicial Council Forms to the Family Law, Probate, and Attorney-Client Matters volumes.

Effective with this update, every Judicial Council Form will be included in ProDoc.

In addition to the volumes, we are creating the following special purpose PowerPacks with features you will find extremely useful:

Guardianship PowerPack™

• UCCJEA program - This program enables you to enter all the requisite information about addresses and prior cases affecting the minors in a user friendly data entry format. This will simplify and speed your generation of form GC-120.
• Inventory and Appraisal program - Easily create estate inventories by simply entering all the necessary information once in a simple-to-use spreadsheet. ProDoc then automatically calculates the value of the estate, completely eliminating manual calculations—and potential errors. This will simplify and speed your generation of the GC-040 and GC-041 forms.
• Accounting program - Using this feature, you enter information relating to the estate’s assets, receipts, disbursements, distributions, capital transactions, remaining assets, etc. in a simple-to-use spreadsheet. ProDoc handles all of the associated calculations for you and generates the necessary reports and documents. The Accounting program will also enable you to import data from the Inventory and Appraisal program. And, you will be able to generate accountings over multiple accounting periods. This feature will greatly simplify and speed your generation of the new GC-400 and GC-405 forms, as well as all of the related schedules and worksheets.

Conservatorship PowerPack™

• Inventory and Appraisal program - Easily create estate inventories by simply entering all the necessary information once in a simple-to-use spreadsheet. ProDoc then automatically calculates the value of the estate, completely eliminating manual calculations—and potential errors. This will simplify and speed your generation of the GC-040 and GC-041 forms.
• Accounting program - Using this feature, you enter information relating to the estate’s assets; receipts, disbursements, attorney’s fees, distributions, capital transactions, remaining assets, etc. in a simple-to-use spreadsheet. ProDoc handles all of the associated calculations for you and generates the necessary reports and documents. This feature will greatly simplify and speed your generation of the new GC-400 and GC-405 forms, as well as all of the related schedules and worksheets.

The PowerPacks enable you to quickly and easily enter the data for their respective purpose. That data is stored in ProDoc and reused wherever and whenever needed in other forms you generate through ProDoc. It's all about us finding even more ways to save you even more time!

Thanks for being a ProDoc subscriber!

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Is Your ProDoc Current?

The current version of our California ProDoc is 5.047.

If you did not install the December update, more than 200 of your ProDoc forms are no longer current. And, if you don't install the update soon it will "time out" on you putting an ignominious, but temporary, end to your document generation.

To tell what version of ProDoc is currently running on your computer, start ProDoc and look in the upper left corner of your monitor. You'll see the version provided to the left of your firm name.

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Looking for Guardianships and Conservatorships Subject Matter Experts

We’re looking for California Subject Matter Experts to help us create the best possible Conservatorship, Guardianship, and Juvenile law volumes we can provide you. If you consider yourself knowledgeable and experienced in any of these areas of law, we would love to be able to call upon you for assistance.

We expect that we would contact you no more than once every couple of weeks, or so—maybe 10-15 minutes each time. The purpose would be to ask for your feedback or suggestions on form content and/or design.

If you are willing to assist us, or to request more information before you volunteer, please Bruce Nims or call him at 800-759-5418. Bruce is the attorney in charge of all of our California products.

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Trial Tip: Trial Tips Newsletter

The weekly newsletter claims that in five minutes every week you'll learn a new courtroom advocacy secret that will help you persuade jurors and win trials. Sign up for a free trial of the newsletter and you'll also receive (1) great quotations to spice up your arguments, (2) important questions to ask yourself after trial so you can hone your trial skills and guarantee your continued success, (3) receive a FREE 32 page report, “The Top Ten Tips for Trial Lawyers”, and (4) an audio class, “The 10 Critical Mistakes Lawyers Make in Opening Statement.”

Learn more about Trial Tips Newsletter and obtain your FREE reports >>

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Practice Tip: ABA's Top 10 Ethics Traps

With help from Steven Gillers and other experts on professional conduct, the ABA Journal listed its 10 top ethics traps for lawyers. Some of these traps might seem a bit arcane, others obvious. But according to the ABA's experts, lawyers in all practice fields fall into them regularly—sometimes with disastrous effects.

The ABA's Top 10 Ethics Traps >>

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Tech Tip: Make Regular Backups Your New Year's Resolution

You know you should regularly backup your computer so you don't lose valuable, ever irreplaceable, data if your computer hard drive were to crash, or forces of nature destroy your office and equipment.

And yet, our Customer Support team fields multiple phone calls every month from desperate attorneys who've experienced just such a catastrophe - and they had not gotten around to regular backups. Or, a high school kid set up an automated backup routine for them that does not include certain key files, such as ProDoc data.

We urge you to make a resolution today to initiate a regular and comprehensive backup routine in your firm. You'll find here information about making sure your ProDoc and SOS data is backed up properly:

Backing up ProDoc files to prevent disaster in your firm >>

And, if you run into difficulties, please call our Customer Support team at 800-759-5418 for assistance. Remember that our customer support is a free benefit of your ProDoc subscription.

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Tech Tip: Dictionary/Encyclopedia of Computer Terms

Are you in the dark when it comes to computer terms, but unwilling to let others in on your secret? Well, we've found the perfect site for you. Smart Computing magazine has compiled an extremely comprehensive site to look up and read about just about any computer term.

Check out the Smart Computing Dictionary/Encyclopedia >>

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View Past Issues of this eZine

Looking for a Tech Tip from a past ProDoc eZine... but can't find that old eZine? We keep recent past issues on our website for your review.

View past issues of the ProDoc eZine >>

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Come By and Meet Us

Come by and visit us if you'll be attending — we'd love to see you!

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Vent—Tell Us What's on Your Mind

This is your opportunity to what's on your mind. Email us your suggestions and other feedback.

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