Major Canadian Legal Services Firm Cuts Document Production Time With ActiveDocs Opus

KANSAS CITY, Mo., Oct. 19, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- One of Canada's largest civil enforcement agencies has chosen ActiveDocs Opus software to automate production of documents that support legal services ranging from property recovery to contract enforcement in all of the country's 10 provinces.

Consolidated Civil Enforcement chose the ActiveDocs software because its Web services functionality and back-end interfaces made it easy to integrate with the company's Microsoft SQL database. Consolidated had been using document automation software, but when the company wanted to automate more aggressively it faced the prospect of an expensive custom integration to develop an interface for this software to link to its back-end data systems. ActiveDocs' open database connectivity (ODBC) enabled Consolidated to easily integrate document automation with its SQL database to eliminate repetitive work that created opportunities for errors in legal documents. The back-end data integration is critical in the long term as Consolidated implements a new file management system that will house even more of the company's vital information in the SQL database.

"ActiveDocs is part of a new system we're rolling out for meeting our recovery managers' needs, to help them process more documents in less time. To achieve that goal, we needed to tie our document production with our data systems," said Steve Low, Consolidated Civil Enforcement's chief information officer. "HotDocs would have been expensive to integrate with our database, but ActiveDocs Opus solved this problem for us easily. Also, as we expand, we have found ActiveDocs' template creation to be faster and simpler than HotDocs. As a result, we have non-developers building templates and saving the company money."

Consolidated's database houses information needed to produce the thousands of warrants, writs and supporting documents that Consolidated's recovery managers need in the field. The company's 40 recovery managers choose a document template from the ActiveDocs Opus' interface, and the system automatically populates it with the client's name and contact information, property locations, etc.

Much of the information contained in legal documents is repeated from one document to the next. ActiveDocs Opus' automation reduces the chance of errors by automatically retrieving the information for each new document. Accuracy is critical, Low said, because many of Consolidated's enforcement services involve seizing property and those cases can result in legal action.

"Something as simple as transcribing information should never jeopardize an important legal proceeding. Not when it's so easy to automate that process with ActiveDocs Opus," said Faine Mende, president of ActiveDocs North America. "Consolidated Civil Enforcement is demonstrating how important and easy it is to put the right resources in the right place by automating information retrieval. This frees their recovery managers to focus on the more important tasks which is invaluable."

About Consolidated Civil Enforcement

Consolidated Civil Enforcement is a Canadian company providing comprehensive civil enforcement and bailiff services. These include: personal property recovery, vehicle recovery, judgment recovery, sale of land, garnishment, document service, and others. For more information about Calgary, Alberta-based Consolidated Civil Enforcement, please visit http://www.ccebailiff.ca/.

About ActiveDocs

ActiveDocs develops template management and document automation software that reduces the time and expense of creating documents, while mitigating the potential risk caused by inaccurate information. The company's solutions lower the possibility of complaints, legal issues and financial losses caused by manual document creation and help companies personalize standard, repeatable information. ActiveDocs has more than 60,000 users at 450 companies, including 122 of the U.S. Fortune 500. For more information please contact ActiveDocs at [email protected].

SOURCE ActiveDocs