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Workflow smartened up by speech recognition

The facts

The customer
Hermans-Wirix Advocaten, Tongeren, Belgium
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Philips partner
Marcel Heens Bureautique
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The solution
SpeechMike Premium Touch Dictation Microphone
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PocketMemo Voice Recorder
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SpeechExec Transcription Set
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Law firm Hermans-Wirix from Tongeren is adding speech recognition to their daily workflow.

Hermans-Wirix Advocaten is a young and dynamic law firm with all staff in their thirties and forties. The firm consists of four lawyers and two administrative assistants who defend the interests of their clients in the field of commercial and corporate law. The firm is dedicated to entrepreneurs and has only business clients. Lawyer Christophe Hermans and his colleague Pieter Wirix are also both receivers at the Commercial Court of Tongeren. 

Mr Wirix has been dictating for about ten years. He first started with analog dictation using cassette tapes, then switched to digital dictation and recently also started to use speech recognition. Lawyer Wirix: “The analog dictation went well in itself, but the cassette tapes wear quickly and were also quite expensive and sometimes the quality was not really perfect, which is why we switched to digital dictation at my previous office.” 

Lots of advantages

He thinks one of the main advantages of digital dictation is the sound quality. The words are clear and comprehensible, and this is a great advantage for our administrative staff. Another advantage for our staff is that a certain feature can be applied to the voice files. “We can enter a keyword to indicate whether it is an e-mail, a letter or an internal memo, which makes employees immediately aware of which software to open”, explains Mr Wirix. Nico Moris, administrative assistant to Mr Wirix adds: “A dictation file can also be assigned to a specific person, so we can make a distinction between tasks to be typed by me or by my colleague.” 

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It is really practical how I can easily switch from digital dictation to speech recognition by one push of the button

Pieter Wirix
Lawyer, Hermans-Wirix Advocaten, Tongeren

Another plus, according to Moris, is the user-friendliness of the software, which provides a well-organised overview of the minutes remaining for each dictate. A message appears on the screen when Mr Wirix has finished a dictate and the assistant is able to see if it is an urgent task or not. “If there are any urgent dictation files, Mr Wirix can mark it with an exclamation mark. In that case the whole line will be highlighted in red and I know that he wants this done the same day, to make sure that it can be sent by post, or e-mail to the client or the court.”

Speech recognition, easy to use

Mr Wirix recently also started to use speech recognition technology. Some time ago he was introduced to the Philips speech recognition software at the Tongeren Bar and did a test with it. “I read a text and my voice was recognised almost immediately. The text appeared almost correctly and perfectly on the screen, so I was hooked quite soon to the new Philips technology.”

The installation through the Philips dealer, Marcel Heens Bureautique, went really well. They offered support for the configuration of the software programme and also explained to us how to operate the hardware. But Mr Wirix concludes: “Everything is so intuitive, so easy to control.” He has been using the Philips SpeechMike for some time now and he thinks it is really practical how he can easily switch from digital dictation to speech recognition by one push of the button. He explains: “We continue to use digital dictation because we often give orders to the employees while dictating, like if they have to make a scan, or copy something. This is more difficult with speech recognition. Speech recognition is used for larger letters, larger texts, shorter writs of summons or submissions and that is very practical for these uses.” 

The solution

More satisfied customers

“Would we recommend Philips SpeechLive? Rather not—otherwise, our competitors would be as well organized as we are.“

Dr. Michael Bergmann, Partner at Raue Law Firm in Berlin

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“Being a lawyer is a hard job, and I owe much of my success to how I’ve been able to use technology to my advantage“

Marc Jonas, Shareholder and co-chair of the firm’s Land Use and Zoning practice group, Eastburn and Gray, PC

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“Solutions like SpeechLive are the wave of the future. We got up and running with minimal training and we can make changes and adjustments as needed very easily.“

Julie A. Gorney Manager, Information Technologies

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“In the case of an urgent dictation, I send it with a red indicator and I can monitor it by simply consulting the software, to find out when it has been dealt with and by which secretary.“

Anne-Sophie Vérité, Laywer

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