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CUSTOMERSPOTLIGHT

Law rm creates searchable archive of case documents, letters, and faxeswith Adobe Acrobat and Acrobat Messenger

Adobe

Acrobat

Adobe Acrobat Messenger

™

Pinnacle LawGroup LLP

Pinnacle Law Group LLP in San Franciscorevolutionized how it handles case-relateddocuments, letters, and faxes with a searchabledocument archive based on Adobe Acrobatsoftware, Acrobat Messenger software, and aWorldox electronic document managementsystem (EDMS). For the rm, the ability toefciently manage client les and quickly reviewand retrieve information is critical. The Adobetechnologies, which were recommended tothe rm by Adobe integrator Baker+CadenceSolutions, aid Pinnacle in streamlining costly and administration-intensive tasks.With a staff of 15 lawyers, paralegals, andadministrative assistants, Pinnacle specializesin real estate transactions and related matters,and complex civil litigation. Like most law rms,Pinnacle invested an enormous amount of timeand resources in managing volumes of paper; yet paper fell short of meeting attorneys’ needs.For example, documents that arrived by postalmail or fax, such as lease agreements and creditchecks, could not be accessed by attorneys work-ing off-site. And attorneys who wanted to bringsupporting materials to court had to carry mul-tiple binders, often with thousands of pages,which were nearly impossible to search thor-oughly in limited time.

Complete, searchable archive

Pinnacle overcomes these challenges by convert-ing documents—Microsoft Ofce les, faxes,postal mail—to Adobe PDF (Portable DocumentFormat). Each night, the Worldox EDMS indexesnew documents created that day. “Adobe PDFis great for archiving legal documents becauseit maintains exact delity with original docu-ments, including signatures,” says Jason Heard,rm administrator at Pinnacle. And unlike theTIFF les used by some rms, Adobe PDF lescan include both images and searchable text inone compact le.Searchable les save hours and days of work forPinnacle. If attorneys want everything relating toa waiver of subrogation for a project, for example,paralegals can search the archive and generate alist of related documents in ten seconds. “Pagingthrough documents to identify conicts of inter-est previously took days,” says Heard. “Withsearchable Adobe PDF les, it takes seconds—andwe don’t run the risk of overlooking something.”

Paper-to-digital link

When the rm receives paper documents, suchas faxed client lease agreements and credit checks,le clerks simply scan them at a centrally locatedAcrobat Messenger workstation shared by staff company-wide. Acrobat Messenger instantly converts the documents to Adobe PDF les andthen stores them in the archive, e-mails them, orfaxes them. “Acrobat Messenger is the paper-to-digital link in our electronic workow, enablingus to convert upward of 1,000 paper documentsweekly to Adobe PDF,” says Heard.

PROFILE

• Law rm with practices in realestate transactions and relatedmatters, and complex civillitigation• Employees: 15• Headquarters: San Francisco,California

• www.pinnaclelawgroup.com

BENEFITS SUMMARY

• Acrobat Messenger enablesPinnacle to conveniently convertpaper documents to searchableAdobe PDF les that look exactlylike the originals.• Pinnacle uses Adobe Acrobatto easily convert documentsto Adobe PDF les to complywith federal and state courtrequirements for electronic ling.• Forms features in Acrobat softwarespeed the completion andsubmission of federal and statecourt materials in Adobe PDF.• By e-mailing Adobe PDF les toclients and the courts, Pinnaclesaves $10,000 a year in labor,courier, and fax costs.• Adobe PDF meets lawyers’needs because it maintains exactdelity with original documents,including signatures.• The ability to search Adobe PDFles enables Pinnacle to quicklyidentify conicts of interest, a task that previously took hours or days.• Attorneys can save Adobe PDFles on CD-ROM and bring themto court for evidence.• File clerks use Acrobat Messengerto e-mail Adobe PDF les of postalmail to employees working off-site.