PracticePanther Legal Software Reviews

Ease of use, and tutorials that allowed me to quickly gain the requisite knowledge for utilizing each feature were absolutely critical to starting my law firm. One of the greatest assets to Practice Panther is its amazing team. I love the one on one trainings, and how many of the features I had questions about were already on the agenda for discussion (provided by the team member conducting the training ahead of time). Thus, saving me time, and only needing me to add additional ones, if necessary. I love the tutorials, templates, pop ups, and live chat features. Live chats have been so helpful in a pinch when I encounter a new challenge with things like linking two client matters together. I love how links to possible video tutorials pop up, while I am waiting for a team member to reply, to see if my question can be answered with one of the step by step videos . I use those videos for future references all the time.

There is nothing I do not like about the software. I only had one hiccup with syncing the LawPay feature with Practice Panther, and one of my client's could not submit their credit card payment online. There was an additional step after your LawPay account is approved, and you must go into your Practice Panther account settings to select the banking accounts that you want to use with LawPay. There were no instructions for this step in the process. However, this appeared to be more of a LawPay issue due to the 3 day time delay for approving the LawPay account. Because Practice Panther is so easy to use, I was actually able to figure out where the problem was, and get my client's payment through within a few minutes. Both Practice Panther and LawPay were quick on responding to the issue, and did an amazing job.

I like the intuitive interface, clean look, and the ability to customize my own workflows.

I would like to see a private server capability added in instead of having to rely on Box. One that we can access via VPN would be helpful. I wish we could add in a bit more automation customization. For example, I would like to be able to send my clients a customized email with attachments and helpful info before specific events, rather than the generic reminder email. I would also like the ability to create conditional logic in certain events.

Helps me manage my solo practice all by myself. My clients are satisfied with their client portal and ability to send me messages.

I would like to be able to make payment plan invoices for my clients, so I do not have to remind them to pay every month. Most clients would not want to set up automatic payments, so with payment plan invoices, it would help alot and relieve the burden of reminding clients every month, that a payment needs to be made.

Being able to integrate all of the features expected of a legal management software in one, but in such a intuitive way.

Nothing. I am very happy with it. We've been using it for 2 years and they keep adding great additional features as we and other request them, but its still not clunky.

The software is simple its flexible and allows for use across platforms so Mac Windows etc
The support team superb
Since using we have seen a 45 per cent increase in billable hours

Nothing, it's great software nothing at all I don't like

We like the client portal where we can send clients messages and documents. The software is not easy to use. The reports are not user friendly, they do not meet our needs. It is difficult to maneuver.

I have to keep a separate data base for my clients because there is no way to print an envelope from PP. Our software automatically renewed annually and we had a staff member who left our company shortly thereafter. We decided not to replace the position. I contacted PP almost immediately thereafter and have been trying to get a refund of that user's account fees and after a month, they finally got back to me and they will not refund the annual subscription fee. So, if you are on an annual plan, you cannot reduce the number of user accounts you have. The three way trust account reconciliation is not a true reconciliation that complies with the Rules of Professional Responsibility, so we have to still reconcile using other software. The email sync only works with limited versions of Outlook. When we signed up, we were assured their customer service was top notch and the longer I am with them, the longer it takes to get answers. Many times, they will close my help tickets without answering the questions. If you leave a bad review for their company they will call and address the review immediately, but they will not address the underlying issue that resulted in the bad review. Despite me raising my concerns over the software, no changes have been made.

It's very hard to pinpoint what I like the most about PracticePanther since there are so many features I rely on for my law practice. I very much like that I can find everything related to a contact or matter in one place. All emails and their attachments, notes, documents, billing, payments, calendar, "to do" list (Tasks), time entries, and communications for a contact and matter can be found in PracticePanther. I use the templates and workflows on a daily basis, which save me time and keep me on track. With a simple click I can send an online questionnaire to a client that, once completed, is kept in the client account.

The tags allow me to filter and label my contacts and matters any way I want. I use PantherPay for online payments which is very easy and shows all payments in the billing account immediately.

I also like that new features are made available regularly - the software is always improving!

1) Would like for clients to start, save, and continue an intake form at a later time and have them receive a copy of their answers after being submitted.

2) The timer buffers endlessly if the page has not been refreshed. I realize you are working on this. :-/

3) If a client has a PP account with another law firm, that client cannot open a new account with my firm using that same email address. Is there a way to fix this?

4) Would love to have conditional/dynamic fields in the intake forms.

I love the IT help, the invoicing system and the templates feature. I had a lot of questions and needed a lot of help in the beginning. Being able to schedule times to discuss my issues with the IT guys at PracticePanther was great. The fact that they can take over your computer remotely so they can see what you see in real time is even better. Their response time to non-scheduled issues is pretty fast. I have also found their FAQs and how to videos to be extremely helpful but having a live person to speak with who can access your computer is just as good as having someone standing next to me while I work.

The invoicing system is phenomenal. It keeps track of all of my client banking accounts. I can see at any time how much is in my IOLTA account, how much is in my operating account, how much a client owes, how much a client has paid and how much I have billed a client but not yet invoiced. I can do this client by client, matter by matter or as an overall total. LawPay is free if you sign up through PracticePanther which is awesome because it handles my credit card transactions and when a client pays, it automatically updates my invoicing and accounts. PracticePanther also knows how to deduct things from a client's retainer when sending out an invoice so you don't have to worry about that either. Their timing device feeds right into the system. It is awesome.

Before PracticePanther, there was no aggregation of data that would allow me to analyze in real-time how we were performing, and we were leaving a lot of pennies on the table because of it. We were able to take an outdated, paper-based reporting system and modernize it. This allowed us to get a clear picture and make adjustments as needed. In a world where there is more remote work, it becomes more important than ever to be able to track those things so that your business is maximizing its profitability and efficiency with its employees.

The most stressful part for us was getting all the data into the system in a format that would work. Once it’s in there and rolling, it cuts down on so much work. There’s a little pain upfront, but you’ll find that with any software like this, that it takes a bit of time to get it right, once it’s in there you really do wonder how you lived without it.

What I loved about this software is that it is very complete. It allows you to have a database of all your clients with all the information you will need to work on their case. Also, time tracker to track work time for every client. It doesn't only do that, it allows you to issue an invoice and send it to clients. In addition to this, the program allows to create matters, this makes it very easy to track the work and very useful because every client we had could have several matters open. The task assignment is amazing and the calendar features incredible. The support I received whenever I had an issue, was very good quality.

What I didn't like was that it has an amazing sync with your dropbox and email BUT if you deleted any matter the whole folder in dropbox erased. So, if we deleted something just to close the case it would be deleted from our database in dropbox. We as lawyer, needed to keep files for at least 3 years.

There are too many to list. On the top - great customer service. I'll say that again - great customer service! Ability to have Panther open in two or more screens to perform various tasks at the same time. Ease of use. Being able to create work flows. Customizable (not sure if that's a word, but it is true.) Multiple time entry screen. Being able to export time and expense entries into an Excel spreadsheet. Mobile app for on the go. Tasks and deadline reminders to my cell phone. Oh - and a great price! Plus the Practice Panther team is always updating and improving the software. Tutorials? Super helpful.

Probably the most annoying thing is that when I come in to work the dashboard is not updated to reflect the new day. I have to refresh. There are a few fields that don't let me edit them (because I messed them up and now want to clean them up). Um.... maybe when I lose my time entries because the computer goes down, but I'm not sure I attribute that to Panther. Perhaps an auto save in the background?

The look and feel was one of our deciding factors to go with PracticePanther. It’s incredibly intuitive, and most of your data is available whenever you need it. In immigration law, there’s a lot of very important dates and information that need to be tracked, so being able to create all the custom fields we needed was a big win. I also love how easy it is to track our billing. We can automatically track who has paid, and then follow-up with anyone we still need to collect from. Giving extra transparency to our clients really showcases our ability to use technology to enhance our services.

When starting with any new software you need to approach it with some patience. There’s a lot of training available, both videos and text-based. So getting ramped-up and knowing that we needed to experiment with customization and intake forms, and get the team to support using it was going to take some time.

Other than it being a "one stop shop" and the ease of accessibility, I have been impressed with Practice Panther's ability to respond to my specific needs. A significant amount of my work is for unions and clients with multiple matters. Initially, Practice Panther was unable handle invoicing and billing for an individual contact with multiple matters. However, I approached them with my needs and they created a "fix" to their system within a week. They also followed up to ensure that I was satisfied. I was certainly impressed by Practice Panther's speed and attentiveness.

I am still trying to learn all of the ins and outs. I need a bit more tutelage on the nuances. At times, customer service may not answer all of the questions, however, they have been very responsive to my needs once I call or make them known.

The organization of this software, entry systems and program itself are all easy to use and easy to train new employees on.

When I originally bought this software, this company was pretty new. They were very communicative and very helpful. Since they have grown, they have lost some of their customer service. They have recently added new things which help their bottom line but aren't as customer focuses as they once were.

Ease of use, iphone ap, customer service, training videos, layout

I honestly cannot think of anything I don't like

I like the set up and font size of Practice Panther. Once you get use to the functionality, it is easy to operate and understand.

The customer service does not follow-up with any real responses other than "we are working on it". It has taken months of no real response to a very simple issue. I would say the inability or lack of IT people that can fix the bugs that exist in program would make me reconsider whether the investment in Practice Panther is worth it.