Our rating is based on our subjective judgment. Use our resources—including our rating and community ratings and reviews—to find the best fit for your firm.
Community Rating: 3/5 (based on 1 rating)
The community rating is based on the average of the community reviews below.
Composite Rating: 3.7/5
The composite rating is a weighted average of our rating and the community ratings below.
Centerbase is a highly configurable and robust cloud-based law practice management software committed to helping law firms run their most successful practice possible. It delivers a powerful and flexible data management product for small-to-medium sized law firms. With all its features, it may be overkill for some solo practitioners, and is probably best suited for firms of 5 lawyers or more. It offers workflow automations that can be customized for each firm’s needs.
Centerbase Highlights
Mapped Drive. Files can be opened and saved directly to a Centerbase drive that can be mapped to your network. 5 TB of storage is included with your subscription package.
Updated Accounting Tool. Centerbase now features a powerful and complete general ledger accounting system for financials. You can bill clients, manage attorney and firm expenses, and create an accounting journal to better track bills and invoices. With their integrated accounting module, you can have live bank feeds of all your accounts.
Continuous Improvement. The company updates its software every 2-4 weeks. Updates are based on customer feedback, improving its features based on what their customers want.
Centerbase Pricing
Subscriptions start at $52/user/month. The Firm Management tier features practice management, calendaring, billing and reporting, and automated workflow, document management, and access to integrations, among other features. The next tier is $62/user/month and features all of the above features, plus full ledger accounting.
For law practice management software, the following are essential features, and you should therefore expect to see a check in every box in this section.
Case/Matter Management
Matter management is the defining feature of law practice management software, of course. However, some software is targeted at specific practice areas and may implement case management in different ways in order to manage information specific to those practice areas.
✓
Client/Contact Management
Managing clients and other contacts is a core feature of law practice management software.
✓
Task Management
Basic task management includes creating tasks with due dates that can be associated with cases/matters and assigned to different lawyers. Some products stick to pretty basic task management, while others offer enough features to make any Getting Things Done devotee happy.
✓
Calendar
As with email, this feature means a full calendar client, not just an integration with Outlook or Google Calendar.
✓
Timekeeping
Timekeeping is a core feature of practice management software, essential for lawyers who bill by the hour but useful even for those who don't.
✓
Additional Features
Conflict Checking
An actual conflict checker is more than just a search box. This applies to software that actually has a conflict checking feature. Implementation varies, but at a minimum you should be able to search the entire database for matching names. It should check for conflicts accurately and intuitively, allow for a lateral hire to input their conflict database into the system, work quickly when new clients call, and comply with the rules of professional conduct for checking conflicts.
✓
Email Client
Does it include a full email client? (Alternative solutions that don't amount to an email client, like plugins for Outlook or Gmail, do not earn a check for this feature. See software integrations, below.))
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Document Management
Basic document management allows you to add documents and associate them with your cases/matters.
✓
Document Assembly
Loading your firm’s document templates into your law practice management software can save time and ensure consistency. This check means basic document assembly suitable for form letters, invoices, etc. For advanced document assembly, you’ll probably need additional software.
✓
Secure Client Portal
✓
Basic Bookkeeping
This means basic checkbook register–style bookkeeping, which is more limited than full accounting. You should be able to keep track of your operating accounts and reconcile your balances, but you may still need full accounting software.
✓
Trust Accounting
This means you can track your client trust accounts, including expenses and payments. It is normal to see trust accounting without basic bookkeeping or full accounting, in which case you will need something else for accounting.
✓
Full Accounting
Some software includes full double-entry accounting features, making additional accounting software unnecessary.
✓
Billing & Invoicing
Does the software allow you to send bills or invoices?
✓
Online Payments
Payment processing is increasingly offered either as an included or add-on feature, especially with cloud-based law practice management software.
✓
Software Integrations
LawPay
LawToolBox
Microsoft Office 365
NetDocuments
Quickbooks Online
Open API
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Things You Might Want to Know
Integrations. Centerbase features integrations with Office 365, NetDocuments, QuickBooks, LawPay, and Stripe. Since it rolls out updates every 2-4 weeks, more integrations are certainly on the horizon.
Mobile Apps. Centerbase features mobile apps for iOS and Android so you can do your work from your phone.
Security. The company hosts its own servers, has multiple data centers, and owns its own infrastructure. They use 256-bit AES encryption for data at rest and 256-bit SSL encryption for data in transit.
Training and Consultants. Implementation and training is not included in the purchase price. The company partners with consultants on all their rollouts, and you must hire a certified consultant—who is not employed by Centerbase—for training and configuration. Those fees will depend on the consultant.
Who Centerbase Is For
Centerbase is a highly- customizable and powerful law practice management software. Its trust accounting features make it useful for family law and estate planning practitioners, and its practice management and workflow automation also make it useful for litigation firms. With everything that it can offer and because of the need for outside consultants for training and implementation, it may be overkill for some solo practitioners. It is probably better suited for firms with 5 or more lawyers.
Centerbase is a powerful product but customer support is the worst I have ever experienced for any software product–I predict it will be their downfall. Perhaps they treat larger firms better, but their attitude toward a small firm is appalling and arrogant. Centerbase’s customer service model is to require you to use a third-party “partner” at $200/hour. The Centerbase system touts customizability as a key feature; however, if your customization causes a glitch (which is easy because documentation is primitive), Centerbase will charge you $200/hour to fix their system. Their attitude toward a small firm is “too bad”–even after you have invested hundreds of hours in implementation.
Centerbase Customer Support is Appalling
Centerbase is a powerful product but customer support is the worst I have ever experienced for any software product–I predict it will be their downfall. Perhaps they treat larger firms better, but their attitude toward a small firm is appalling and arrogant. Centerbase’s customer service model is to require you to use a third-party “partner” at $200/hour. The Centerbase system touts customizability as a key feature; however, if your customization causes a glitch (which is easy because documentation is primitive), Centerbase will charge you $200/hour to fix their system. Their attitude toward a small firm is “too bad”–even after you have invested hundreds of hours in implementation.
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