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Law Firms Services Overview


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RubinBrown’s Law Firms Services Group provides a range of tax, consulting and assurance services to law firms and their partners. We have a dedicated business unit, staffed with professionals with deep industry experience, to serve the unique needs of law firms. With the capability of providing a suite of wide-ranging services, as professional advisors, we specialize in helping law firms and their partners realize a sound financial future.

 

Cyber Attestation and Law Firms

Law firms are being targeted by cyber criminals at an ever-increasing pace. Some of the country’s most prestigious firms have found themselves in the headlines because hackers exploited weaknesses in their information systems.

One of the options to protect against these threats, is defined by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) through an attestation engagement in order to provide an opinion on the internal controls at service organizations, such as law firms.

The purpose of this whitepaper is to provide more information on these types of engagements and why they would be ideal for law firms operating in the environment where the focus on information system integrity is intense. 

CLICK HERE TO VIEW CYBER ATTESTATION AND LAW FIRMS

 

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Cyber Security Services for Law Firms

RubinBrown’s Cyber Security Advisory Services team monitors emerging threats and trends, develops tools and methodologies to address them and delivers specialized services to organizations seeking independent third party testing support.


Tax Services

  • For the law firm partnership:
    • Federal and state compliance
    • Mergers and acquisitions
    • State nexus issues
    • Federal and state tax controversies
  • For the law firm partners, on an individual basis:
    • Tailored, personalized preparation of individual attorney tax returns or arrangements offered to all partners using a standard flat fee for each return
    • Investment advisory services for firm and partners

Analysis of Operations & Business Consulting

  • Due diligence procedures related to mergers and acquisitions
  • Agreed-upon procedures
    • Cash disbursement and receipt analytics
    • Monitoring procedures for compliance with firm policies
  • Internal control reviews and consultations
  • Firm restructuring, start-ups and dissolutions

Assurance Services

  • Audits, reviews and compilations of financial statements
  • Retirement plan audits

Litigation Support

  • Consulting and expert witness services regarding economic damages and lost profits
  • Investigative and forensic accounting services including fraud investigations
  • Accounting and financial advisory services to debtors, creditors, trustees and receivers in bankruptcy and consensual reorganizations
  • Business valuations for closely held businesses, including determination of the fair market value of business interests and the identification and valuation of intangible assets
  • Valuations concerning estates and estate planning

Continuing Legal Education Courses

  • Advanced-level programs
  • Includes trial graphics, cites to published sources and practice aids
  • Customizable for needs of individual law firms
  • Qualify for CLE credits ranging from 1 to 4 hours
  • Programs presently available include:
    • Proving Economic Damages
    • Understanding Present Value Computations in Business Litigation (Discounting and Capitalization of Earnings)
    • “Multiple Myths” – Exploring the Uses (and Misuses) of Earnings Multiples

RubinBrown’s Cash Analytics empowers clients with a deep, objective understanding of their cash environments through actionable insight and proactive monitoring.

Cash Disbursement Analytics

Ensure Compliance and Identify Opportunity

Analyze and test data for:

  • Duplicate payments and invoices
  • Duplicate purchase orders
  • Top vendors by payments
  • Top employees by payments
  • Payment frequencies and patterns
  • Vendors master file
  • Payroll master file
  • Payment timing

Fraud Focus

Identify and Mitigate
  • Analyze address of payee to identify payments made to PO boxes or to vendors with same address as employees
  • Identify employees in the vendor master file
  • Perform employee payment frequency analysis to identify irregular disbursements
  • Compare employee tax ID’s and contact information to vendor information to identify conflicts of interest
  • Review the vendor and payroll master files for completeness
  • Identify payments made to vendors or payees outside of the vendor and payroll master files
  • Apply Benford’s Law analysis to identify potentially fraudulent transactions

01/20/2017

Focus on Law Firms: Tax Implications for New Partners


The end of the calendar year usually coincides with law firms announcing partner promotions. When law firms are structured as partnerships, newly promoted partners can expect their tax situation to change for the 2017 filing year. For tax purposes, the partnerships report the firm income and the income “flows through” to the individual partners of the firm.

10/25/2016

Focus on Law Firms: 10 Ways Employees Can Steal from Your Law Firm and How Data Analytics Can Help You Detect Fraud


Every year, organizations lose an estimated 5% of revenue to fraud. While fraud can never be completely eliminated, controls can be implemented to drastically reduce the chance of fraud in your firm. Establishing a strong ethical culture and a zero tolerance policy for fraud is a good first line of defense. This culture can be supported through strong written policies and internal processes that embrace best practices and strong preventive controls.

07/25/2016

Focus on Law Firms: Law Firm Merger Activity – An Update


For an increasing number of law firms, the pursuit of mergers and acquisitions has become a primary strategy for continued growth. Across the country, law firm leaders are finding that the demand for law services is flat and there was a record number of deals in 2015 as a result of heated competition among firms for new work.

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