What is Legal Ebilling?
First started in the US in the mid-1990’s as an alternative to legal auditing, legal ebilling was originally a tool for law departments, governmental, educational or insurance claims organizations to automate the receipt, review and payment of Outside Counsel invoices. By using LEDES™ billing formats and UTBMS coding, organizations were finally able to gain insight into legal spend, view invoices in a standard format, and apply electronic testing to ensure compliance of invoices with their Outside Counsel Guidelines.
Early adopters were thrilled by the functionality provided in these systems and instantly clamored for additional features. By 2000, vendors began expanding systems to include comprehensive matter management functionality within a single platform in order to provide more detailed analysis of the services provided by Outside Counsel. Vendors’ added features to handle rate management, budgeting, case assessment, timekeeping and manual invoicing.
Going Global
By 2002, many first adopters in the US wanted to expand ebilling to include their global legal vendors. Simultaneously, system vendors began to look for prospective clients outside the US. As was quickly learned, the reality of expanding legal ebilling outside the US was far more difficult than anticipated.
How is Global Legal Ebilling Different?
