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GAZETTE
DECEMBER 1994
T E C H N O L O G Y
N O T E S
So f t wa re in t he Sol i c i tors
Prac t i ce in I re l and
Introduction
In May 1993 a letter went to the
managing partner in every solicitors
office in Ireland. The purpose of the
survey was to establish the level of
automation in solicitors offices in
particular in relation to
wordprocessing and accounts
packages. The survey also sought to
assess the nature of other software
packages being used by solicitors in
their offices.
The survey sought to establish the
satisfaction level of the users of both
computerised and manual systems
with such systems and their suppliers.
It was hoped that the survey would
identify what solicitors themselves
required by the provision of a wish list
in the survey. The Technology
Committee also hoped that the survey
would identify particular areas of
interest to the profession in order to
give its activities greater focus.
The response to the survey is set out
below on a county by county basis. It
indicates the county concerned, the
number of respondents to the survey
and the total number of practices in
that county.
Meath
5
28
Monaghan
2
16
Offal y
3
22
Roscommon
6
22
Sligo
9
22
Tipperary
15
57
Waterford
12
26
Westmeath
8
22
Wexford
17
32
Wicklow
9
40
Total
330
1611
There was no response from County
Donegal.
Survey Response
The survey response reflects the state
of computerisation in approximately
20.5% of all practices in the country.
It therefore gives a fairly accurate
picture of the use of technology by the
profession. It is likely that the non-use
of computers in solicitors offices is
somewhat higher than the survey
indicates as it would be expected that
the non computer users would be less
likely to respond than those practices
who are computerised.
There were a number of discernable
trends to emerge from the survey. In
some counties there was a noticeable
difference in the use of computers
both in accounts and the use of other
packages within the practice than in
others. This would appear to be
because the use of a computer system
is perceived to give a sufficient
advantage to that practice to compel
other practices to follow suit. There
appears to be a good degree of
co-operation amongst colleagues in
the selection of the appropriate
software packages for a practice in
these counties.
The awareness of software available
to solicitors is limited in almost all
counties. Document management
systems are widely available and
indeed the requirements for many
practices in relation to precedents
could be more than satisfied by the
appropriate use of any wordprocessing
packages. The CORT software
Irish Packages Statistics
Wordprocessing
County
Response
Practices
Carlow
5
11
Cavan
5
22
Clare
3
26
Cork
30
170
Dublin
121
715
Galway
24
86
Kerry
8
43
Kildare
7
45
Kilkenny
2
16
Laois
1
15
Limerick
13
58
Leitrim
3
10
Longford
4
14
Louth
9
38
Mayo
9
41
Wordprocessing
Legend
WordPerfect
•
W a ng
•
Q Office
|
Wordstar
Other
|
Manual
WordPerfect
374