Watkins Law Firm removes the headache of trust accounting with TrustBooks
For more than 30 years, Michael Watkins has practiced law in the military, public, and private sector, serving as a Claims Officer, Defense Attorney, Military Judge, City Attorney, and as an Assistant Prosecutor. During these decades of experience, he has experienced first-hand the radical evolution of technology used by lawyers.
Like most lawyers, Michael not only practices law but is also required by law to “keep the books.” As he reminisced, “For many years when it came to trust accounting, we used the 3-part one write manual system with actual pen, paper, and folders.” For Watkins Law Firm and many other law firms at the time, that was how trust accounting was done. According to Michael, it wasn’t that complicated, it was just tedious.
Brandon Smith – TEST
This is a test testimonial.
Slade Trabucco
Client Invoicing makes it incredibly easy for me to send invoices. I know exactly what’s happening with sending invoices and getting paid. It’s a no brainer!
Trust Accounting With Technology
In 1999, to stay up with the times, Watkins Law Firm adopted QuickBooks for their trust accounting. Michael immediately noticed a difference, "QuickBooks added hours of complexity to our trust accounting every month." Trust accounting and monthly reconciliations went from bad to worse. As a lawyer, his desire was to practice law, not to function as an accountant. For Michael, trust accounting became unnecessarily more complicated.
Several years ago, the Watkins Law Firm decided to do a detailed personal audit of their trust accounts. In Michael's own words, "it was really messed up." As Michael and his wife went through dozens of accounts over a several year period, they quickly realized their books were not right. "The errors were so in-depth. We had to go through thousands of entries by hand in order to find why our trust accounts were off balance." Despite spending 4-6 hours every month reconciling their trust accounts, the errors continued to propagate in QuickBooks. "Simply put, QuickBooks is an accounting tool. It is not made for Trust Accounting."
Brandon Smith – TEST
This is a test testimonial.
Slade Trabucco
Client Invoicing makes it incredibly easy for me to send invoices. I know exactly what’s happening with sending invoices and getting paid. It’s a no brainer!
Switching to a Trust Accounting Software
Michael and his wife, Marilyn, were initially skeptical about switching to TrustBooks, thinking it would be just another technical tool they would have to learn to manipulate. Michael decided to test TrustBooks while his wife would continue using QuickBooks. "I transferred all the balances into TrustBooks, and it just worked right away. My wife would spend hours in QuickBooks and maybe get the right answer. I spent an hour and was able to complete it perfectly."
It wasn't long before Michael's wife, Marilyn, came around. Now Watkins Law Firm uses QuickBooks for general accounting, but not for Trust Accounts. "Despite being as skeptical as she was at the beginning, my wife will never use QuickBooks again for trust accounting. From now on she will only use TrustBooks."
For Watkins Law Firm, they needed a solution that would keep them legal, error-free, and balanced with their trust accounting. "TrustBooks is simply dedicated to our trust accounts. No more running formulas and complicated reports like in QuickBooks. With a push of a button we can immediately see balances, errors, transactions, everything. We will never go back."
Brandon Smith – TEST
This is a test testimonial.
Slade Trabucco
Client Invoicing makes it incredibly easy for me to send invoices. I know exactly what’s happening with sending invoices and getting paid. It’s a no brainer!