Adobe Success Story

With 800 attorneys, 12 offices nationwide, and an international presence in Lisbon, Porto, Brussels, Paris, New York, and Sao Paulo, Cuatrecasas is the second largest law firm in Spain. The company, founded in 1917, deals mainly with corporate law. The company’s focus on delivering outstanding services has played an important role in enabling Cuatrecasas to increase annual revenues by as much as 20%.

Cuatrecasas is known as a technology innovator, employing a staff of more than 35 professionals in its IT department. "We are pioneers in the legal industry in many areas of information technology, including security and mobility," says Francesc Muñoz, director of information technology at Cuatracasas. "We are also the first law firm to attain certification for an information security management system."

Once Spain passed a law on electronic invoicing, Cuatrecasas decided to implement a new and technologically innovative project. "We wanted to automate our invoice processes to reduce costs, as well to enhance the efficiency of our internal operations while ensuring data integrity and confidentiality," explains Muñoz.

A lightweight solution
To implement a process for creating and delivering electronic invoices, Cuatrecasas needed a solution that could meet the needs of attorneys and customers who had little experience with receiving invoices electronically. "Our attorneys did not want invoices to be sent as Microsoft Word files because the documents are not always reliable and are easy to manipulate," says Muñoz.

"Our focus was on finding an electronic format that appeared more finished, attractive, and was more secure." It was also important for Cuatrecases to find an electronic format in which the digital content appeared the same as information on printed pages.

After evaluating their options, the firm realized that electronic documents in Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF) were the market standard. "Following our market research and talks with Adobe we concluded that Adobe Acrobat Elements was the best solution to our problems," explains Muñoz. With the Adobe software, the firm can create, control, and deliver reliable documents in Adobe PDF throughout the organization. "We considered other solutions," Muñoz adds, "but we wanted something more lightweight. We also thought that the change would be easier for customers and for businesses if electronic invoices looked exactly like the traditional invoice on paper."

For the firm’s IT managers, a primary advantage of the Adobe solution was that it integrated perfectly with its existing IT systems and mapped to both the firm’s and its customers’ needs. To reduce the possibility of invoicing errors and accelerate generating invoices, the fields in the Adobe PDF documents are filled in automatically with data from Cuatrecasas client systems. Implementation of the automated invoicing processes was done by the firm and IpsCA, a consultancy that specializes in deploying electronic invoicing solutions.

Benefits

• Reduce invoicing costs by thousands of dollars annually
• Boost employee productivity with streamlined invoice creation and delivery
• Meet client demand for processes that support both electronic and manual workflows
• Enhance client services with faster, more convenient invoicing options

Project Details

Spanning paper and digital worlds
"The Adobe solution integrated easily with our invoicing system," says Muñoz. "Our goal is to initially automate internal processes for invoice review and approval—and ultimately, we can deliver invoices in ways best suited to our clients." The more automated processes at Cuatrecasas need reliable document controls because not all invoices are the same. Muñoz explains, "We are not Telefónica or Gas Natural that has the same type of invoice for everyone. Some of our invoices have to be delivered on paper to meet the requirements of certain clients. However, much of our standard invoicing can be done electronically and we needed a system that supports paper-based and electronic document delivery."

To increase client satisfaction with and adoption of the automated processes, the firm offers clients the option of receiving invoices electronically or on paper, anticipating that more clients will opt for electronic processes over time.

Muñoz summarizes the main benefit of the adoption of this new system: "Our aim is to implement more efficient workflows." Today, the invoicing process is as easy as touching a button to generate the documents, followed by a simple click to accept the invoice, and then integrate it automatically with the firm’s ERP system showing that Cuatrecasas is, once again, driving an innovative use of technology to improve customer services. From a technology perspective, the solution was put into place quickly and integrated perfectly with the firm’s systems.

Bottom-line benefits
The electronic invoicing workflow also delivers financial benefits to the firm. The cost of sending an invoice on paper has been calculated at approximately 1 euro. For companies like Cuatrecasas—that issue thousands of invoices annually—the savings are dramatic. And of course, for companies that issue millions of invoices annually, the benefits are even greater. According to Muñoz, implementation of the automated processes costs approximately €30,000, yet the ongoing costs to distribute invoices are subsequently reduced.

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