As our company responds to COVID-19, the health and safety of our clients, employees, service providers and communities remain our top priority. The work we do is critical to the legal system and to providing access to justice. The business of law is essential and the need to service our clients remains vital. Here’s how we’re working to keep our community safe while enabling important cases to move forward.

The business of conducting depositions and accessing important medical records has traditionally relied heavily on in-person service delivery. Then the pandemic hit and, almost overnight, we had to change our model around the related travel, social distancing and stay-at-home order limitations – balancing the continued needs of our clients with the health of our employees and service providers.

We simultaneously coordinate three major initiatives in a matter of days:

• Instantly moving over our 400+ office-based Lexitas employees to remote-based workspaces
• Deploying detailed information to our independently contracted reporters regarding new remote proceeding attendance practices
• Communicating a well-articulated outreach program to our client base to let them know that depositions could still be conducted remotely and medical record requests could still be fulfilled by Lexitas using well established web-based technologies

As metro areas around the country began to shut down, we received many cancellations and saw a dramatic drop in the number of new jobs scheduled each day. Our first priority was to get jobs back on the calendar so that reporters would have enough work and our clients’ cases could proceed. We conducted a sustained client education program utilizing email, social media, and many hundreds of personal phone calls. Our staff worked tirelessly to provide live demos to clients, which included many sessions attended by entire litigation departments at many law firms.

For reporters, we created a comprehensive help guide on exactly what the remote deposition process looks like, how to participate in the proceedings, new exhibit handling practices, and more. We’ve also worked closely with reporters unfamiliar with our solution, testing our technology with their equipment prior to their first remote proceeding. In addition, we provide technical support on every remote deposition to troubleshoot, if needed, and ensure that proceedings begin on time.

As the months pass, we continue to see a steady increase in new bookings, feedback from our clients and reporters has been very positive. We feel incredibly fortunate to be partnering with wonderful reporters, employees, clients, and medical facilities - all working so hard to keep legal proceedings moving forward. It is too soon to tell what exactly the “new normal” will be post COVID-19, but we anticipate that the demand for remote proceedings will remain robust for at least the next year. Even once travel limitations are lifted, we believe that many firms will have embraced their ability to realize efficiencies and cost savings via remote depositions, resulting in a higher level of sustained utilization of our remote solutions. Remote deposition expansion will further allow us to provide our reporter independent contractors with work that best fits their schedules and lifestyles. Ultimately, our company is being strengthened throughout this process, adding even more value for our clients in a post-COVID world.