Deposit summaries are essential aspects of a litigation. They’re so important that they determine the direction the case goes and the questions that are asked in court. This means then, that a trial lawyer has to take the time to write an accurate deposition summary to help them prepare for trial.
This article will cover how long it takes to write a deposition summary and reasons to outsource this task to a depo summary service or contract paralegal.
How long it takes to write a depo summary
Writing depo summaries is tedious. On average, the experienced paralegal summarizes 20 – 25 pages of transcripts in an hour. That means that for a 100 page transcript, it takes 4 to 5 hours, and for a 1000 page transcript, it takes 40 to 50 hours.
Apart from the length of the transcript, other factors affect how long it takes to write a deposition summary. These include the complexity of the case, the format of the summary, the experience of the paralegal, and how familiar they are with that particular case. The type of witness can also affect how long a transcript gets. For instance, an expert witness is more likely to cause a longer deposition time than a lay witness.
Reasons to outsource deposition summaries
Significantly reduces workload
Hiring a depo summary service takes hours of reading through transcripts, even for seasoned paralegals. Research shows that for an experienced paralegal, the time to prepaid a depo summary from a 200 page transcript is 8 hours. Once you hire a depo summary service, you can easily send the transcripts over, and get the summaries back in hours or a few days.
Saves cost and time
Think of the hours that your legal team has to spend drafting depo summaries. And the fact that they get less done when they spend countless hours on summaries. A reliable deposition summary service takes it all away.
You only have to send the transcripts to the agency and have the summaries back in a few days, depending on length and complexity. Depo summary services save you the time and cost of maintaining a legal team that still has to grapple with prepping depo summaries.
Depo summaries remain a part of the litigation process, and any lawyer who’s worth their weight don’t substitute them with anything. Still, preparing depo summaries eat away at work time. Hire 4cornersdepo today to prepare superb depo summaries for you and your law firm.
