E-JCC, What a Tool!?!

There are some really handy tools in the e-JCC program. In December 2014, I posted regarding the new pretrial compliance questionnaire tool. That tool can be used to prepare for mediation or to submit a pretrial questionnaire. The functionality comes from your ability to use it to generate a list of the pending issues, as reflected in the OJCC database for that case.

Any party to a case can generate a form for the pretrial process. That form will populate with all of the required demographic data, such as dates, names and addresses. The form will also list all of the currently pending issues in the case, as listed in the database. This allows parties to check and verify. If an issue is listed that has been resolved, or if an issue is missing, this alerts the parties to file a pleading to correct the database.

For the last couple of years, you have been able to check your daily filings in e-JCC. This is a great benefit to double check the service process. The method and reasons are fully explained in Check your Daily Filings. Emails can be missed, just like letters might have been misdirected or lost in the U.S. Mail era. Checking all daily filings is highly recommended and should help prevent any problems with miscommunication. 

Also for the last couple of years, we have had a feature available in e-JCC to allow you to double-check your calendar settings. The tool has been in the function bar of e-JCC. Selecting "My Schedule" would display all of your calendared upcoming events. 

"All" upcoming events and hearings can be quite an assortment and volume for some attorneys. The hearings and mediations on this screen will be displayed in date order. With a great volume of pending cases and with the date order, it can be time consuming to check events well in the future. But, you could easily check it today to see what is coming up the rest of this week, or to see what you have next week. 

We recently added a new functionality to this "My Schedule" tool. Now it can be sorted based on the type of hearing. So, you could use it to see a list of your upcoming pre-trials, or mediations, or trials. Just select the drop down arrow

Then select the type of appointment you wish from the list and click "Apply Filter." This will produce a list for you of precisely the kinds of appointments in which you are interested at the moment. You can generate a list of upcoming mediations, pre-trial deadlines, and more. 

Diligent attorneys will be using all of these tools weekly or more often. This My Schedule function is a quick and easy method for attorneys to double check what their calendars document. This will assist with deadlines, planning work flow in your office, and should prevent missed appointments. The Daily Filings will likewise prevent missed documents. 

Using these two functions to check daily filings and to verify the calendar are powerful tools to keep the attorney in control of the flow of litigation. The pretrial form is a critical tool to review pending issues either for mediation or for that pretrial compliance questionnaire. Attorneys should become familiar and comfortable with these tools.