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CARET Legal vs Tabs3

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Our analysts compared CARET Legal vs Tabs3 based on data from our 400+ point analysis of Legal Software, user reviews and our own crowdsourced data from our free software selection platform.

Overview Pricing Benefits & Features Analyst Ratings Comparison Charts User Ratings Analyst Summary Screenshots
CARET Legal Software Tool
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Tabs3 Software Tool
SelectHub Award Winner
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Product Basics

Analyst Rating

86 Detailed Analysis

User Sentiment

Excellent User Sentiment (345 Reviews)

Analyst Rating

79 Detailed Analysis

User Sentiment

Excellent User Sentiment (355 Reviews)
CARET Legal (formerly Zola Suite) is a cloud-based practice management solution with integrated matter management, CRM, time tracking and billing capabilities. Businesses can centralize all firm and client data, track time and expenses, and manage operating and trust accounts. It helps prepare digital invoices, run financial reports and connect legal matters with associated contacts, documents, communications and tasks to get complete visibility over active cases. The built-in legal calendar tracks important events and touchpoints in real time.

It complies with SOC 2 auditing standards and secures sensitive information via military-grade encryption and user permissions. Companies can expedite client onboarding with trigger-based workflows and intelligent forms. It integrates with third-party applications for continued scalability.
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Tabs3 is an integrated suite of solutions designed for law firms to streamline their entire matter lifecycle. Practices can opt and pay for only the modules they need, which include billing, practice management, general ledger, accounts payable and trust accounting. It requires minimal implementation and can be deployed either in the cloud or on-premises. It has an array of ways to review important metrics, track billable hours, send bills and get paid faster.

In addition to modifying account structures with ease, users can stay on top of their cash flows by tracking and resolving invoices, bank statements, deposits and payments. It improves firm-wide monitoring with dashboards to visualize historical data and flexible reporting on productivity, profitability, billing and other aspects. Users can access it on the go from any device and use numerous integrations to enrich it.
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$150/User, Monthly
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Tailored to your specific needs
$40 Monthly
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Tailored to your specific needs
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Windows
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Android
Chromebook
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Linux
Android
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On-Premise
Mobile
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On-Premise
Mobile

Product Assistance

Documentation
In Person
Live Online
Videos
Webinars
Documentation
In Person
Live Online
Videos
Webinars
Email
Phone
Chat
FAQ
Forum
Knowledge Base
24/7 Live Support
Email
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Knowledge Base
24/7 Live Support

Product Insights

  • Easier Data Management: A centrally accessible data repository provides a single source of truth for all employees and team members. 
  • Prompt Customer Support: Offers multiple support options to clients with quick response times. 
  • Flexible Accounting: Provides in-house accounting tools and integration with QuickBooks. 
  • Onboarding Support: Minimize time to market with dedicated onboarding and data migration support. 
  • Better Insights and Decisions: Comprehensively diagnose the firm’s financial health, productivity, profitability and efficiency metrics with powerful built-in reports. 
  • Global Reach: The mobile app provides unrestricted access to all features, including time tracking, matter management, emails, payment portal, billing and OCR capabilities. 
  • Seamless Integration: CARET Legal seamlessly integrates with your existing systems, streamlining workflows and eliminating data silos.
  • Enhanced Efficiency: Automated processes and intuitive dashboards empower your team to work smarter, saving time and resources.
  • Improved Collaboration: Secure document sharing, real-time communication, and collaborative workspaces foster seamless teamwork.
  • Advanced Analytics: Data-driven insights provide actionable intelligence, empowering you to make informed decisions and optimize operations.
  • Exceptional Security: Industry-leading security measures protect sensitive data, ensuring compliance and safeguarding your clients' information.
  • Tailored to Your Needs: Customizable settings and flexible configurations adapt CARET Legal to the unique requirements of your practice.
  • Enhanced Client Experience: Client portals and self-service options provide transparency and empower clients to actively participate in their cases.
  • Timely Reporting: Automated reporting capabilities deliver real-time visibility into key metrics, enabling proactive decision-making.
  • Expert Support: Our dedicated team of legal experts provides ongoing support, ensuring a smooth implementation and maximizing your ROI.
  • Future-Proof Innovation: CARET Legal is continuously updated with the latest technologies and best practices, ensuring your firm remains at the forefront of legal innovation.
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  • Expedited Billing: Boost cash flow with multiple payment modes, mobile payment options, and customizable statements and payment plans.  
  • Streamlined Data Management: Quickly find legal matters, records and case information with electronic data organization and easy-to-use search tools. 
  • Sync With Court Rules: Seamlessly sync the legal calendar to Federal and State-based jurisdictional rules with affiliations to ALA and ABA. 
  • All-in-One Connectivity: Stay connected regardless of the mode of deployment using a mobile app. 
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  • Matter Management: Use the matter dashboard to track active cases in real time. Create custom fields with check-boxes, dates, pick lists and currency and record all matter-specific activities, including time entries. Limit access to sensitive information on a per-matter basis and categorize matters based on practice area, responsible attorney, custom fields and open date. 
  • Intelligent Email: Automatically file emails to associated case files and add time entries for sent emails. The proprietary smart suggest feature locates associated contacts. Convert emails to tasks, matters and billable hours. 
  • Integrations: Supported integrations include G Suite, Exchange, Microsoft 365, RPost, Outlook, Google Calendar, NetDocuments, OneDrive, LawPay and QuickBooks. 
  • Calendar: Send ICS invites, create time entries, set private events, mark recurring events and follow up on team obligations. Set up daily, weekly or monthly schedules for report delivery. 
    • Rules-Based Calendaring: Integrate with LawToolBox to automatically track procedural, administrative and regulatory deadlines. 
    • Date Calculator: Factor in days out, federal holidays and weekends while calculating dates for templates and deadlines. 
  • Legal Contacts: Create cards and lists for various legal contacts, including clients, prospects, witnesses, opposition counsels and referral sources. Generate custom fields and categorize them based on contact role, created by and contact type. 
  • Legal Documentation: Store multiple legal documents depending on the subscription plan. Access instant preview of documents, in-document search, complete version history and file locking and tagging capabilities. Create matter-specific document folders and securely share files via the Caseway portal. 
    • Word Ribbon Plugin: Create, open and save documents directly from Microsoft Word. 
  • CRM: Filter leads by source, practice area and potential revenue and convert them to matters. Identify successful referral sources with intelligent metrics. Embed intake forms into the firm’s website. Automatically create lead entries and generate retainer agreements and standard documents.  
  • Task Management: Tag, sort, filter and create sub-tasks based on requirements. Implement standardized procedures using task templates. Delegate tasks to team members, turn on notifications and assign deadlines. 
  • Client Portal: Allow clients to exchange case-related documents via a 256-bit encrypted channel. The payment portal can process both debit and credit card transactions. Request and approve eSignatures instantly. 
  • Mobile App: Available for both Android and iOS users. Insurers can design custom logos, send and receive documents, share invoices and receive payments. Secures access via fingerprint authentication and Apple TouchID. 
  • Time and Billing: Choose from over 11 ways to create time entries. Build custom invoices with support for UTBMS codes and LEDES format. Run financial reports, develop accounts payable and trust checks, process payments and more. Manages vendor bills and supports split, consolidated and separate billing frequencies. 
    • Time Entry: Create automated time entries and assign “no charge” and “no charge don’t show” labels. Designate round-up increments and log time entries in decimals or HH:MM format. 
    • Rate Cards: Create rate cards with custom user rates. Allow clients to inherit rate cards and set matter-specific discount rates. 
    • Expenses: Automatically track all expenses. Charge soft costs and import copy activities from photocopier devices via the uniFLOW importer. 
  • Business Accounting: Earmark part of payments for expenses and to timekeepers. Set up firm-wide budgets to predict revenue on a monthly, quarterly or yearly basis. Run year-end reconciliations and add time entries for individual transactions. 
    • Reports: Run built-in client, compensation, productivity, accounting, trust and vendor reports. 
  • Trust Accounting: Manage trust accounts separately. Accept payments via checks and debit and credit cards. Administrators can withdraw money from trust accounts to avoid overdrawing from operating accounts. 
    • Retainer/Trust Fund: Create retainers for trust and operating accounts and get notifications when the balance falls below the minimum. View and print ledgers and trust account summaries with sub-ledgers. Run three-way reconciliation reports. 
  • Smart Settlement: Intelligently manage settlement workflows, including percentages and memo generation for all involved parties. Create a settlement statement for every settlement memo. Capture expenses incurred by the firm, clients and third parties in a detailed value list.  
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  • Financial Management: Manage firm financials with the end-to-end accounting portal. Interact directly with the billing module to issue checks, print financial statements, operate trust accounts and perform year-end reconciliations. 
    • General Ledger: Balance operating and trust accounts with the general ledger tool. 
    • Accounts Payable: Track all incoming and outgoing transactions for a holistic view of firm financials. Monitor aging receivables, cash requirements, vendor payments, recurring payments and voided checks. 
    • Trust Accounting: Automatically log all transactions made from trust accounts. Reconcile deposits and withdrawals and print checks from the client’s trust fund. 
    • Integrations: Supports integrations with Tabs3 Billing Software, Tabs3 Accounts Payable Software and Tabs3 General Ledger Software. 
    • 1099 Forms: Combine payment disbursements to vendors and trust account payees with the 1099 form. Always maintain compliance with IRS regulations. 
  • Matter Management: View a quick feed of matter-specific information like contacts, communication history, case notes, documentation and invoices directly into the dashboard. Verify the billing summary of matter information and issue invoices against unpaid bills. 
  • Calendar Management: Switch between firm-wide and personal calendar views to get a 360-degree picture of firm obligations. Schedule individual and/or collective appointments and color-code them based on associated staff and activities. 
    • Deadline Checks: Automatically check new calendar entries against existing events for scheduling conflicts. Set up custom federal, state, county and jurisdiction-based rules for detecting deadlines. 
    • Notifications: Notify individual or collective staff members about important events and hearings. 
    • Recurring Meetings: Automate calendar entries for recurring events that take place at both regular and irregular time intervals. 
    • Planning Templates: Prepare sequential events with calendar planning templates. Use event-based or time-based triggers for court rules and collection follow-ups. 
  • Conflict Checks: Check all potential clients for conflicts of interest. Investigate legal documents, emails, matters and attachments for partial and/or phonetic matches to the conflict checking tool. 
  • Email Management: Integrate with Microsoft Outlook to automatically track time spent on writing and reviewing client emails. Add emails directly to client files, perform conflict checks and sort by associated matter. 
  • Time and Expense Tracking: Track every minute of time spent on client activities and correspondence with multiple built-in timers. Interact directly with the billing portal to issue invoices directly from time entries. Set custom billing and increment rates for individual clients. 
  • Document Management: Organize legal documents by connecting them to associated matters and clients. Import scanned documents using the PaperPort extension. Track various changes made to a document across previous versions. 
    • Smart Documents: Autofill common data fields with information already in the firm database. Automatically issue invoices for any document-related activity. 
  • Workflow Automation: Engineer custom workflow patterns with up to 10 tasks including emails, communication, documentation, appointments and more. Assign tasks to staff members with trigger-based alerts. 
  • Controlled Access: Restrict access to sensitive documents with permission-based accounts and customizable viewership controls. Permit edits for specific data fields. 
  • Backup and Recovery: Secure firm information with regular backups. Export firm data at any time in case of power outages or network failures. 
  • eNote: Send secure messages in real time with the built-in messaging portal. Send appointment links and reminders along with text messages. 
  • Billing: Use the billing portal to directly transform time entries into billable hours. Prepare tailored bills with quick access to client contacts, payment history, write-offs, WIP, account balance and more. 
    • Billing Flexibility: Process payments faster with flexible billing methods. Issue contingency, retainer, hourly, flat fee or threshold-based bills and design custom rate charts for specific clients. 
    • Online Payments: Accept credit card transactions for expedited payments. Use the Tabs3Pay tool to email online payment links along with client invoices. Supports integration for LawPay and ProPay. 
    • Reports: Generate built-in reports for greater insights into revenue, important clients, receivables, compensation, productivity, profitable practice areas and more. 
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Product Ranking

#46

among all
Legal Software

#49

among all
Legal Software

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Analyst Rating Summary

86
79
100
96
90
69
99
83
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Billing and Payments
Task Management
Time and Expense Management
Dashboard and Reporting
Matter/Case Management
Time and Expense Management
Billing and Payments

Analyst Ratings for Functional Requirements Customize This Data Customize This Data

CARET Legal
Tabs3
+ Add Product + Add Product
Billing And Payments Calendaring And Legal Docketing Client And Contact Management Dashboard And Reporting Document Management Matter/Case Management Mobile Capabilities Task Management Time And Expense Management 100 90 99 65 92 67 100 100 96 69 83 69 64 78 67 100 0 25 50 75 100
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94%
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100%
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92%
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8%
58%
0%
42%
100%
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80%
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20%
64%
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36%
64%
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36%
89%
0%
11%
67%
0%
33%
67%
0%
33%
78%
0%
22%
100%
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67%
0%
33%
100%
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Analyst Ratings for Technical Requirements Customize This Data Customize This Data

86%
0%
14%
71%
0%
29%
75%
0%
25%
75%
0%
25%

User Sentiment Summary

Excellent User Sentiment 345 reviews
Excellent User Sentiment 355 reviews
94%
of users recommend this product

CARET Legal has a 'excellent' User Satisfaction Rating of 94% when considering 345 user reviews from 3 recognized software review sites.

93%
of users recommend this product

Tabs3 has a 'excellent' User Satisfaction Rating of 93% when considering 355 user reviews from 4 recognized software review sites.

4.8 (114)
3.8 (27)
4.64 (119)
4.7 (160)
4.6 (112)
4.7 (166)
n/a
3.9 (2)

Awards

SelectHub research analysts have evaluated CARET Legal and concluded it earns best-in-class honors for Billing and Payments and Task Management. CARET Legal stands above the rest by achieving an ‘Excellent’ rating as a User Favorite.

User Favorite Award
Billing and Payments Award
Task Management Award

Tabs3 stands above the rest by achieving an ‘Excellent’ rating as a User Favorite.

User Favorite Award

Synopsis of User Ratings and Reviews

Robust Legal Case Management: CARET Legal offers a comprehensive suite of tools for managing cases, including document management, calendaring, and time tracking, streamlining legal operations.
Excellent Collaboration Features: Its intuitive interface fosters collaboration among team members, allowing seamless sharing of documents, notes, and tasks, enhancing teamwork.
Customized Reporting: CARET Legal's customizable reporting capabilities provide tailored insights into case progress, resource allocation, and billing, enabling data-driven decision-making.
Automated Workflows: The software automates repetitive tasks such as document generation and approval processes, freeing up lawyers to focus on higher-value work.
Improved Efficiency and Productivity: By centralizing legal operations and automating tasks, CARET Legal helps firms improve efficiency, reduce turnaround times, and enhance productivity.
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Intuitive Interface: Users highlight the user-friendliness of Tabs3, making it easy to navigate and manage legal tasks.
Comprehensive Features: Tabs3 is praised for its wide array of features, covering various aspects of legal practice management, from time tracking and billing to document management.
Robust Reporting: Users appreciate the detailed reporting capabilities of Tabs3, allowing for insightful analysis of financial and operational data.
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Limited Customization: Many users find that CARET Legal's customization options are limited, making it difficult to tailor the software to their specific needs.
Steep Learning Curve: The software's complex interface and lack of user-friendly features can make it challenging for users to navigate and use effectively.
Expensive: CARET Legal's pricing model is often seen as expensive, especially for small to medium-sized law firms with limited budgets.
Integration Issues: Users have reported difficulties integrating CARET Legal with other software applications, leading to workflow disruptions and data management challenges.
Limited Support: Some users have experienced slow response times and inadequate support from CARET Legal's customer service team, leading to frustration and delays in resolving issues.
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Limited Customization: Users have expressed frustration over the inflexibility of certain features, particularly when it comes to document assembly. For instance, one user found it cumbersome that they couldn't easily modify the formatting of numbered clauses within a legal document.
Learning Curve: Legal professionals transitioning from older software versions have reported a steep learning curve with Tabs3. The new interface and features require time and effort to master, impacting productivity during the transition phase.
Integration Challenges: Some users have encountered difficulties integrating Tabs3 with other essential software used in their legal practice. This lack of seamless integration can disrupt workflows and lead to inefficiencies.
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CARET Legal has garnered significant user praise over the past year, with reviewers consistently highlighting its strengths in legal research and document automation. One user remarked that CARET Legal's "research tools are top-notch, making it easy to find relevant case law and statutes." Another reviewer lauded its "intuitive document automation features, which have saved me countless hours drafting contracts and pleadings." Compared to similar products, CARET Legal stands out for its user-friendly interface, comprehensive research capabilities, and robust automation tools. Users have noted that its "clean and organized interface makes it a breeze to navigate," while its "deep integration with legal databases provides access to a wealth of information." The software's ability to automate repetitive tasks has also been a major differentiator, with one reviewer stating that "CARET Legal has streamlined my workflow, freeing up more time for high-value tasks." In summary, CARET Legal is highly recommended for legal professionals seeking a comprehensive and user-friendly legal software solution. Its strengths in research, document automation, and user experience make it an ideal choice for lawyers, paralegals, and legal teams looking to enhance their productivity and efficiency.

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Users rave about Tabs3's robust document management and search capabilities, highlighting its ability to centralize all case-related information, making it easy to find any document quickly. They also appreciate the comprehensive financial tools, including billing, trust accounting, and reporting features, which streamline financial operations and ensure compliance. However, some users find the interface dated and not as intuitive as newer cloud-based solutions like Clio or MyCase. They also point out that the on-premise deployment option, while offering more control, can be more demanding to maintain than cloud-based alternatives. Despite these drawbacks, users consistently praise Tabs3's deep feature set and its long-standing reputation for reliability, making it a solid choice for firms prioritizing stability and comprehensive functionality over a modern user interface. It's particularly well-suited for larger, established firms with complex needs and the IT infrastructure to support an on-premise solution.

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Screenshots

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Head-to-Head Comparison

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