Client portal & e-signature
Give each client their own secure sign-in. They see their case in plain words, read your updates, message you, send photos and bills, sign documents on their phone and pay invoices. Everything your firm sends is approved by a lawyer first.
What clients see
A client signs in and sees only their own matters. No internal notes, no legal jargon: the stage their case is at and what it means, and everything your firm has chosen to share with them.
Lawyer approval
Paralegals and staff can prepare a message, an update or a document to share. It waits as a draft until a lawyer approves it, then goes out under the lawyer's name. Every step is in the audit log.
E-signature
A lawyer sends a PDF for signature. The client agrees to sign electronically, types their name and signs, on a phone or a computer. Meruit then produces a signed PDF with a certificate page and keeps it on the matter.
Client uploads
Clients can upload what they have: photos of the damage, medical bills, letters from the insurer. Each upload lands in the matter's documents, marked as from the client, for your team to review.
How it works
A lawyer or admin invites them by email from the matter.
With a password or Google, on a phone or a computer.
Updates, documents and signature requests, approved by a lawyer.
Messages, photos and bills come back into the matter.
Honest limits
The portal and e-signature cover the everyday work of keeping clients informed and getting ordinary documents signed. Some things need a different tool.
For ordinary documents such as retainer and fee agreements and medical authorizations, the US ESIGN Act and state laws based on UETA generally treat an electronic signature like a signature on paper, as long as the signer agrees to sign electronically and a record is kept. Meruit records both. Some documents are excluded: see the next question. Whether a particular document can be signed electronically is still your call.
Wills, codicils and testamentary trusts, documents that must be notarized, and anything your state requires on paper, which can include some family-law and court documents. The send screen reminds you. If you need notarization, ID checks or a signing order for many parties, keep using your own signing tool for those.
Just their email. A lawyer or admin invites them from the matter; they set a password from the invitation link or use their Google account. It works on a phone. Two-factor sign-in is offered to clients but not required, because most clients sign in rarely and from a phone.
No. Clients see only what your firm chooses to share with them: the stage of their matter in plain words, updates, messages, shared documents, requests to sign and issued invoices. Internal notes, other parties' details and anything you haven't shared stay inside the firm.
A paralegal or staff member can write a message, an update or a document share, but it waits as a draft until a lawyer approves it. Then it goes out under the lawyer's name, and both steps are in the audit log.
No. Clients never get legal advice from a bot. Everything in the portal was written or approved by a lawyer at your firm.
They go into the matter's documents, marked "from the client", for your team to review. Nobody outside your firm sees them, including other clients.
Yes, if your firm has connected its Stripe account. Issued invoices show a "Pay online" button, and the payment goes straight to your operating account. It's for earned fees only, not retainers or trust money.