Firm Central is straightforward small-firm law practice management software that is tightly integrated with Westlaw and several other Thomson Reuters products.
Firm Central Highlights
Tight integration with Thomson Reuters products. This includes Westlaw, Westlaw Form Builder, Practical Law, and Drafting Assistant, although each is sold separately.
Searchability. All documents and other information you upload into Firm Central are indexed to make search quick, easy, and pretty comprehensive.
QuickBooks integration. This software can handle timekeeping, expense tracking, billing, and trust accounting, but it does not have a full accounting package. Instead, it integrates with QuickBooks.
Firm Central Pricing
Firm Central uses tiered pricing. The Core plan is $40/user/month, but most lawyers will want the Essential plan, which is $65/user/month and adds timekeeping and billing and trust accounting. The Premier plan jumps to $105/user/month and includes more powerful features like rules-based calendaring, docket notifications, and more.
It’s worth noting that the Thomson Reuters products with which Firm Central integrates are all priced separately. If you want the benefit of all those integrations you will need the Premier plan plus a subscription to Westlaw, Westlaw Form Builder, Practical Law, and Drafting Assistant, none of which have public pricing charts (which probably means they are quite a lot more expensive than Firm Central).
Features
| Firm Central | Law Ruler | |
|---|---|---|
| Website | FirmCentral.com | lawruler.com |
| Starting Price | $40/user/month | $49/user/month |
| Installation | Cloud | Cloud |
| Apps | Windows Web app iOS app Android app | Web app |
| Email Client | ✓ | |
| Calendar | ✓ | ✓ |
| Client/Contact Mgmt | ✓ | ✓ |
| Case/Matter Mgmt | ✓ | ✓ |
| Task Management | ✓ | ✓ |
| Secure Portal | ✓ | |
| Conflict Checking | ✓ | ✓ |
| Document Mgmt | ✓ | ✓ |
| Document Assembly | ✓ | ✓ |
| Timekeeping | ✓ | ✓ |
| Billing & Invoicing | ✓ | ✓ |
| Online Payments | ✓ | ✓ |
| Trust Accounting | ✓ | ✓ |
| Basic Bookkeeping | ✓ | |
| Full Accounting |
Things You Might Want to Know
Deadline Assistant. Firm Central’s Deadline Assistant tool helps you manage court deadlines and syncs them with your Outlook calendar. You’ll even receive email alerts when important court dates have been changed. Only available to Premier plan subscribers.
Mobile apps. While the web app is mobile-friendly, there are no mobile apps for Firm Central.
Security. This company provides plenty of information about security on its website, but the important parts are these: Firm Central encrypts your data in transit and at rest using “bank-grade” encryption. All data is stored on Thomson’s US-based data centers. (Many other law practice management software providers use Amazon Web Services servers.)
Secure client portal. You and your clients can send and receive messages files, and tasks securely.
Who Firm Central is For
Firm Central is a good fit for existing Westlaw customers. If you don’t use Westlaw or other Thomson Reuters products, or if you need to use integrations with Microsoft Outlook, Windows Explorer, or QuickBooks, Firm Central is still a decent option, but at a fairly high price relative to comparable alternatives.