Replacing a 40-Year-Old Legacy System

CASE STUDY: A Self-Service Client Portal on Top of a 40-Year-Old System

We designed and built a client portal for a construction lien services firm, so its customers can look up their own notices and deadlines while the firm’s forty-year-old system keeps running underneath.

→ The Challenge

The firm’s whole operation ran on a database about forty years old. Customers could not see their own records, so every question came in by email and every request was typed in by hand.

Pain Points

Data Customers Could Not See: Every status question was an email that a staff member had to look up and answer.
Deadlines That Change by State: Lien filing windows differ by state and by notice type, and missing one can cost a subcontractor the right to collect. Tracking them across thousands of open notices was manual.
Invoices Sorted by Hand: Clients send raw invoice files that have to be sorted into what gets a notice filed, what waits, what is a duplicate, and what to leave alone.

→ Our Solution

We built a client portal that reads from the old system without changing it. The old system keeps running the business, and customers get a modern place to look things up and send requests.

We Provided

A Safe Link to the Old System: Each night the portal copies the latest data from the old system into its own database. It never writes back, so nothing the business runs on was put at risk. More than 124,000 notices are now searchable by customers.
Separate Views for Staff, Clients, and Branches: The firm’s staff, client administrators, and branch users each sign in to their own view and see only their own company’s or branch’s records. Administrators can step into a user’s account to help, and both names are logged.
Deadlines Worked Out by State: The portal works out the filing deadline for every notice from its state and type, and warns on the dashboard as a window closes. When a state’s rules change, every affected deadline is recalculated.
Invoice Sorting by Each Client’s Rules: Clients upload raw invoice files and each line is sorted into file now, hold below the dollar limit, likely duplicate, or do not file, using that client’s own rules.

Testimonial

“Our customers used to email us for every status update. Now they look it up themselves, and our team has time for the work that needs a person.”

– Ethan Mercer, CEO Caprenos

Client Portal for Lien Notices

Every notice, searchable

One notice with its job details

A job’s history from notice to release

124,000+

Notices Customers Can Look Up Themselves

→ Lien history back to August 2023, searchable by the clients who used to email and ask.

0

Changes Written Back to the Old System

→ The portal only reads from it, so the system the business runs on is never at risk.

3

Kinds of User, Each With Its Own View

→ The firm’s staff, client administrators, and branch users each see only what is theirs.

4

Ways Each Invoice Line Is Sorted

→ File now, hold below the client’s dollar limit, likely duplicate, or do not file.