Manage case assignment in a law firm | Use Cases - Zoho CRM

Manage case assignment in a law firm

Edition: Enterprise | Industry: Law firm | Features: Customization, Views, Workflow Rules

Scenario
Leotta Dillard is the office administrator at a law firm that specializes in cases against corporations that behave unethically towards their employees, customers, and other businesses. The attorneys take on a variety of cases ranging from unpaid overtime to class action lawsuits. Since each case is unique, the firm trusts the attorneys to choose the cases they are interested in working on and the cases that are not taken on by the attorneys are assigned to the partner, Tresa Sweely, who reviews each case and gets in touch with the client if the case cannot be taken. For cases that have been chosen, the attorneys need a system to track all the interaction, documents, and information acquired throughout the case life cycle. 

Requirements
Leotta is handling the CRM implementation and she wants the CRM to: 

  • Capture all the cases in one place 

  • Allow attorneys to view and choose the cases based on their area of expertise. 

  • Automatically assign the unassigned cases to the partner, Tresa Sweely, after a few days.

  • Track case-related communication, case history, and documents and maintain a backup as per the compliance guidelines.  

Solution

To personalize their CRM, Leotta has renamed the Leads module to New Cases and the Contacts module to Clients.  


Capture case details

Leotta first sets up a web form that collects case-related information from website visitors and pushes it into the New Cases module in CRM. All the incoming cases are assigned to the partner, Tresa Sweely, by default and a tag 'New Case' is assigned to each record. Until the attorneys choose a case and convert it into a client, Tresa is the case owner.

 

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Enable attorneys to choose cases

Leotta has created a custom view that lists all the records that have the 'New Case' tag. The attorneys simply click on the custom view to see the cases. Since Leotta has enabled read/write permission for the New Cases module for all attorneys, they can change the case owner from Tresa to assign it to themselves. They also convert that case into a Client, which moves the record to the Clients module.




Assign cases not chosen by anyone to the partner

Some cases are not chosen by any of the attorneys. To review and close these cases, Leotta has set up a workflow rule that is triggered 3 days after a case is added to the New Cases module and triggers the following actions: 

  • The 'New Case' tag is removed

  • The Case Status field is updated to Not Chosen

  • The partner receives an email notification about the case  

Workflow configuration:

Module
New Cases
Rule name
 Not Chosen Cases
Description (optional)
 Alert the partner about cases that have not been chosen by an attorney
When to execute
On a date/time > 3 days after created time > Recur once
 
Which records the rule should apply to?
New cases matching certain condition
Criteria

Tag is 'New Case'
Instant action
Field update > Case Not Chosen

Remove tag > New Case

Email notification > Case not chose 





Back up case documents and track all case activities in one place

Since CRM provides 360-degree customer information, the attorneys can find all notes, tasks, calls, emails, documents, and other information related to a specific record in the Record Details page. The attorneys use the native attachment field to add documents, screenshots, etc. This helps them track all the case-related activities. Leotta has enabled the auto backup feature, which backs up all CRM data right away. 
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