Chapter 12 · The Vendor Advantage
A Primer on Proper Case Development
David Potter, the Chief Business Development Officer at Case Works, and I view the mass tort industry through a very similar lens. Although David is a lawyer—a member of the bar in both Georgia and Washington, D.C.—he’s spent the majority of his career in finance. He understands the business side of the legal industry. And he can artfully communicate the advantages of using outside vendors, especially as it pertains to case development and backoff ice responsibilities.
Like so many others, David’s career path took a circuitous path after the 2008 financial crisis. He left the world of investment banking to start a private equity company before transitioning into a leadership position at a cuttingedge software company. His career trajectory highlights his understanding of capital as well as the importance of data analysis, two increasingly important differentiators for mass tort lawyers.
His entry into the mass tort space came via Susan Barfield, a former colleague, who invited him to join her rapidly expanding company, Case Works, in 2019. It proved to be a perfect fit for all involved.
When Susan, a nurse by training and serial entrepreneur, managed a team of nurses to complete medical reviews for her brother, prominent mass tort attorney Bill Barfield, she discovered there was a gaping need for case development specialists in the field.
Mass tort trial lawyers knew what was required to move signed clients into an MDL, but many were highly inefficient in doing so. Which is why Case Works was formally launched in 2015.
Case Works has evolved into a full-service case development company. Their specialists not only retrieve and analyze medical files but they also handle every element and detail required to move cases from being newly signed retainers to ready-to-file documents. In addition, they’ve created an elegant set of best practices and technological innovations to ensure mass tort victims are continually updated regarding the status of their case.
The team at Case Works adds value for mass tort lawyers by utilizing their proven Case Ready process to ensure plaintiffs receive the highest settlements possible. The work performed by Case Works is indispensable to trial lawyers across the country, while providing acquisitions lawyers a valuable shortcut to becoming trial lawyers themselves.
—JAcoB MALHerBe
If there’s a single overarching lesson that I try to impress upon new mass tort lawyers, it’s this: You can’t do it all. And if you think you can do it all, you’re putting yourself at a major disadvantage right out of the gate.
Finding success in our industry is often the direct result of adopting a business model that leans on the expertise of outside vendors.
If you’re a personal injury lawyer who’s grown accustomed to checking in with your clients every week, you’re going to need to rethink your schedule. There’s simply not enough time in the day, even if you hire an army of expensive paralegals, to offer that same level of personalized support for hundreds of mass tort clients.
But at Case Works, we’ve developed technologies and a set of best practices to ensure that we can do just that.
Our particular area of focus is case development, which means we handle all of the administrative responsibilities that come after a law firm receives a signed retainer agreement from a client. And I do stress the word “all.”
We welcome clients to your firm. We handle medical record retrieval and analysis. We oversee client management and communications. We draw up plaintiff fact sheets and submit those documents to the court for approval. And we ensure that our law firm clients—and mass tort clients—are shown the attention and empathy that they deserve.
That’s what we do, day in and day out. We lean on case specialists—nurses, medical review experts, trained case managers, shortform complaint specialists—as well as cutting-edge technologies to ensure no medical file is left unturned and no legal need is left unmet.
If these responsibilities are not handled by the right people and the right technology is not leveraged, costly mistakes will emerge. Tweaking a manual process you might have devised when you were a personal injury lawyer simply won’t work. Nor will hiring paralegals who aren’t properly trained to handle these tasks. Just ask the firms who’ve tried to build an in-house staff but wound up seeking our services instead.
It comes down to this: Failing to leverage outside vendors who specialize in handling case workups doesn’t just ensure you’re going to leave valuable revenue on the table, it’s a full-fledged business risk. It doesn’t just cut into your ROI; it can do serious harm to your bottom line and, in some cases, your reputation.
At Case Works, we’ve built a process you can trust. Here’s an abbreviated look at our process and why it’s proven so effective.
Quality, Comprehensiveness, and Value: The Case Works Process As soon as we receive a signed retainer agreement, we begin developing an injured party’s case. But it’s worth noting that not all retainer agreements are created equal. We encourage our law firm clients to hire vendors who properly screen new leads before they ever arrive as a signed retainer on our desks.
For obvious reasons, law firms want to cast a wide net and acquire as many clients as possible. However, true success is measured by how many qualifying clients you can find. Shortcuts employed during the vetting process always come back to haunt mass tort lawyers. At
Case Works, we act as the gatekeeper, vetting out any mistakes, as improperly vetted clients inevitably slow down our process and cost you money.
We encourage our attorneys to contact us early in the process so we can provide them with lead acquisition firm recommendations or, at the very least, provide a set of trusted intake questions. Once we have a solid client list, we can begin our work by adhering to the following key steps.
The Power of First Impressions: The Welcome Call Shortly after receiving a signed retainer agreement, we immediately reach out to the client with a welcome call. In addition to sending emails and text messages, we pick up the phone and call them— without exception. We do this because we’re committed to preserving the trust that’s already been established between the client and their chosen law firms.
This is a critical and often-overlooked initial step in the case development process, as it’s surprising how many firms—due to overworked paralegals—lose signed clients simply because they fail to quickly follow up and establish that relationship.
During our initial welcome call, we set expectations regarding what’s to come, while answering any questions that clients may have about the process. It’s not unusual for our team to spend thirty to forty-five minutes on these calls because we want to make a stellar first impression and gather all pertinent facts about their case.
For some clients, finding the right mass tort lawyer is a little like dipping their toes into the world of online dating. They’re looking for an ideal match, so they keep their options open. It’s not unusual, for example, for clients to contact three or four additional law firms after they’ve signed a retainer agreement.
Any delay in welcoming a client to a firm can fracture a victim’s trust and motivate them to look for a different law firm who will show them the attention they deserve.
At Case Works, we ensure clients never make that second call, first by showing them kindness and empathy and then by following those personal interactions up with a constant stream of updates. Keeping clients updated and well informed through a nurturing campaign results in a great client experience and highly engaged clients.
Clients thirst for information. They want to know how the litigation and their case are progressing. They want to know how corporate defendants are reacting to their claims. We built a robust communication management system that constantly keeps them abreast of every major development in the tort as well as changes in the status of their case.
If there’s a golden rule when it comes to mass tort clients, it’s to set the right expectation up front and maintain client engagement with frequent communication. This drives down dual representation issues and clients becoming unresponsive. This is paramount for lawyers because when it comes time for settlement, they need to be able to easily contact clients.
Beyond the File Cabinet: Medical Record Retrieval and Analysis Case Works is a full-service medical records operation. We acquire medical records and comb every page to ensure the entire picture is captured as it relates to proof of use and proof of injury. This isn’t a simple one- or two-step process; it’s a multitiered one.
We order records based on the information gathered during the intake process. We pull from medical facilities, pharmacies, and a host of different areas to build the most comprehensive file possible.
On the surface, this may seem like a simple job, but it takes a special set of skills and medical expertise to know which records are worth ordering and how to leverage medical information to improve the value of each client’s case.
Sometimes this found value comes in the form of money saved. Order too many records and you’ve wasted valuable time and money. Order too few and you’ll cobble together a flimsy case.
But there is a third criterion, beyond proof of use and proof of injury, that often gets overlooked: we always seek medical evidence that chronicles the extent of a client’s injuries.
At Case Works, simply meeting the burden of proof to file a case is never enough. When we work up cases, we want to find medical evidence that will increase the final settlement amount that clients will be awarded. We are extremely passionate and diligent about this point.
It’s important to remember that every individual mass tort case is graded (i.e., given a different potential monetary value based on the severity of the damages or injuries experienced). It stands to reason that someone who’s been diagnosed with terminal cancer (or God forbid, has passed away) will be granted a more substantial settlement than someone who developed less adverse side effects.
Medical records are the key to proving just how serious and widespread a client’s injuries really are. Courts divide individual cases into different buckets. It’s our job to place as many clients as possible into the highest-paying buckets based on the settlement matrix.
When we work up cases, we want to find medical evidence that will increase the final settlement amount that clients will be awarded. We are extremely passionate and diligent about this point.
In the case of the Zantac mass tort, for example, we’d look to see how advanced a client’s cancer has become. We want to know which treatments a client has received as well as how disruptive the cancer has been to their lives, their livelihood, and their closest family members. We strive to tell each client’s unique story, reflecting the pain and suffering they have endured.
These questions can only be answered by drilling down into the records and by following up with clients so we can gather additional or overlooked details. Given that we already built trust with them during our welcome call, clients are often willing to share very personal information with us.
Running these investigations in-house with paralegals often leads to costly delays—or can send an investigation to a screeching halt—because paralegals aren’t best suited to navigate the system. For instance, it’s not uncommon to order a set of medical records and receive a response back from a medical provider that says “No record found for your request.”
Consider the amount of lost time and resources required to backtrack through the process and determine what went wrong. Sometimes the answer can be as simple as requesting a record from June 2017 instead of July 2017, but in other cases, it takes serious medical detective work to iron out the issue.
Which is one of the reasons we hire medical industry veterans rather than inexperienced straight-out-of-school hires. We are a protocol-driven company and our team reviews medical records all day, every day—driving efficiency and quality.
We create special mass tort teams who focus and educate themselves on specific torts. With repetition comes the ability to review larger number of cases per day versus a paralegal who has to leapfrog back and forth between different torts.
This pays dividends in unexpected ways. Let’s say that a paralegal is working on a hernia mesh case. Oftentimes, they come across a record that shows a client has a qualified product and injury and their review stops there.
They’ve found a qualifying product, so they move onto the next client. But what if the client had a revision surgery? If you’re not an experienced medical professional, you may miss auxiliary medical issues that stemmed from the original injury.
The result? Lost damages. Had this information been included, the client might have won a $100,000 settlement. Without it, that same figure might decline to just $20,000. And in the end, these mistakes ensure smaller payments for clients as well as the lawyers who represented them.
We seek to find the constellation of interconnected injuries that a product or medication might have caused. A client who takes Zantac may develop cancer, but who’s to say that their injuries end there? Their Zantac usage and their cancer might force doctors to implant a medical device or prescribe a medication that comes with its own set of risks. If so, that client may be awarded additional damages or qualify for a separate tort. While reviewing a client’s medical records, we often find cases where multiple defective products are identified. For example, clients who had injuries related to Xarelto often had IVC filters that had caused serious damages.
Continual Feedback: Client Management and Communication At Case Works, we see ourselves as the natural extension of our legal clients. Whenever we contact clients, we do so on behalf of the firms who hire us. In this way, they reap the reputational benefits of our high-touch white-glove service.
We understand that clients yearn for their pain to be acknowledged and validated, which is why we make sure every one of our interactions with clients feels both authentic and empathetic.
Any change in the status of a case generates an update from us. When we acquire a client’s medical records, we contact our clients. When we work up a plaintiff report, we contact them. And when the court accepts their case, we contact them, which comforts clients while simultaneously burnishing the reputation of our law firm clients.
These updates, delivered via text and emails, are handled by our case management system. Clients appreciate the speed and regularity of our system and so do our law firm clients, as it provides them real-time access to every piece of data and update that we catalogue.
Whenever they want to check in on a case, they can do so with nothing less than a few simple clicks.
In many cases, Case Works is hired by law firms to try and patch up these fractured relationships. While we can mend the problems, this recurring problem underscores the reason why we strongly encourage our clients to hire us at the start of the case development process.
We believe you cannot over-communicate. Keeping clients well informed and engaged is the name of the game. This ensures that clients don’t feel the need to bombard their lawyers with questions or complaints. Our law firm clients don’t have to worry about people calling them up and asking, “Hey, when’s my settlement coming?” Or “I’ve reached out to you three times, and nobody has answered my request for information.” Clients don’t feel the need to call or post negative comments about our law firm clients on websites or on public forums like Facebook because we feed them proactive updates.
You can’t overestimate the value that clients place on having meaningful conversations during times of high stress or uncertainty.
Listening with empathy is an invaluable skill, one we hire for and cultivate at Case Works.
Good customer service also provides an often-overlooked benefit: referrals.
As is often the case, customers who are satisfied with a product or feel they’ve been shown exemplary care will share those positive experiences with their friends. And praise, as we all know, can spread like wildfire. We try to create raving fans.
Let’s say you’re working on the Zantac mass tort. Consider all the potential connections that can be made between one satisfied client and the thousands of other potential clients who swim in similar circles. Clients who are satisfied with the level of care they’re receiving will tell others to contact your firm. All because you hired us to not only maintain your reputation but bolster it.
Signed, Sealed, and Delivered: The Plaintiff Fact Sheet A plaintiff fact sheet is one of the single most important filing documents in any mass tort.
Think of a plaintiff fact sheet as a brief biography of the client’s actions and injuries, which helps the court evaluate the merits of their case. The size and depth of each plaintiff fact sheet varies according to the tort. Some fact sheets are relatively simple summaries, spanning just five to ten pages. Some are extraordinarily detailed, extending sixty or seventy pages.
It all comes down to the mass tort in question and the requirements prescribed by the judge.
Plaintiff fact sheets are so vital that we begin creating a needs checklist before we conduct our first welcome call. At Case Works, we’ve found that the earlier we can begin to ask relevant questions for plaintiff fact sheets, the more efficient the entire process becomes.
Once we’ve completed the plaintiff fact sheet, we complete a few more administrative tasks. Attorneys oftentimes ask us to complete the short-form complaint and upload all necessary documents into the MDL portal. We employ experienced paralegals who assist in this stage of the case development pipeline.
No Client Left Behind: Customer Reengagement It’s not uncommon for firms to hire us to find clients who have gone missing or can no longer be contacted. Clients often go “missing” due to a firm’s inability to deploy the necessary level of engagement. Given that mass torts can stretch on for years, many firms simply lack the bandwidth and resources to stay engaged with clients over that time span.
Lawyers who are new to our space are always shocked as to just how many clients—people who are owed money from the settlement—go unresponsive. We estimate that as much as 20 percent of all the clients who are part of a given MDL become unresponsive.
It’s actually quite tragic because the plaintiff-side attorneys and their vendors have done all the hard work already. A settlement has been completed and announced but neither the client nor the attorney can get paid unless the client formally signs a settlement agreement.
Often the very same clients who demanded constant updates are the ones who wind up disappearing when they’re actually due money. There are all sorts of reasons why clients slip through the cracks. Some relocate. Some change cell phone numbers. Some stop checking certain email addresses. That is why it is so critical to regularly contact clients and confirm all contact information and ensure that there are two emergency contacts on every case.
Law firms often hire us to locate these lost clients. We find them, revive the relationship, and ensure they benefit from the settlement.
The Case Works Advantage The issues and cost involved with reengagement further underscores why we prefer to be engaged immediately after a retainer is signed. We are migrating away from cleanup work because we waste so much time undoing the mistakes that led to that fracture in the first place.
For us, it’s a bit like being a relief pitcher who’s being called in to bail our team out of a bases-loaded, no-outs jam. In most cases, we can pitch our way through it, but we know things would have gone a lot smoother if we’d just been handed the ball at the start of the game.
This is one of the reasons we charge a flat fee for our case development services. Our process is built on the premise that we will do everything we can on behalf of our law firm clients.
The fact of the matter is that a large percentage of the mass tort development process is administrative work. It’s not legal work; it’s a process that demands an understanding of efficiencies and step-bystep best practices.
Case Works differentiates itself from others in our space by focusing on three things above all: quality, comprehensiveness, and value.
The quality of our work is a direct result of the people we’ve chosen to hire. We solve any and all problems that might arise on our own. When other vendors hit a wall, they tend to want to kick problems back to the law firms that hired them. We don’t believe in doing that. We take ownership over our professional responsibilities.
We’re the only vendor in this space who can do it all. We can handle every step of the process, from getting a signed retainer in the door to filing with the MDL. There’s not another vendor in our space that runs a more comprehensive process than ours.
And finally, value. From day one, Case Works is thinking about settlement and what is required for every case to be in a position to settle. We have developed the system, reports, and metrics that are required to adequately track this process. We are committed to building the maximum settlement value for each case and earning referrals for our clients. We consult with our law firm clients to ensure they are up to date on case development. It’s a holistic approach created to drive value across the entire life cycle of a mass tort.
Simply put, the time and money spent hiring us to find and analyze medical records often comes back to our clients tenfold. We’ve positioned ourselves as an indispensable support vendor for mass tort trial lawyers.
Yet at the same time, we also see ourselves as disruptors because we have helped countless acquisitions lawyers rise up the ladder and become trial lawyers or settlement lawyers. Our services can be used as a springboard to attain trial work. We not only help build value for clients but we help lawyers earn larger legal fees by leaning on us to work up and file cases as opposed to having to refer out their cases. In this way, we can be a difference-maker for those seeking to rise higher within the world of mass torts.
Simply put, the time and money spent hiring us to find and analyze medical records often comes back to our clients tenfold.
At the end of the day, we take the most pride in helping plaintiffs receive proper restitution for their injuries. That’s why we do what we do, day in and day out. We are in the front line of this epic and ongoing battle. We’re the ones who help plaintiffs retain a sense of hope as the mass tort process unfolds.
People want to know that there’s someone out there who cares for them enough to take their case to court and fight for them. They don’t want to stay angry at the companies or organizations that have wronged them. They want to move on and find some sense of closure.
After all, most of the time when people call lawyers, it’s during one of the worst days of their lives. Something has just gone wrong, and they need help. We step in to ensure that the initial flicker of trust that they felt is never extinguished but rather amplified during their darkest hours. We hope in some small way that we keep the light on for them until they get the justice they so richly deserve.