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Reach CaseRight

Reach CaseRight is an innovation from The Reach Agency designed to provide representative law firms with a whole-of-life solution for class actions.

Leveraging the latest in digital engagement technology, Reach CaseRight provides the tools and resources needed to seamlessly manage the process of promoting, collecting and verifying a plaintiff's personal information and case-related documents.

Regardless of the size or value of the lawsuit, the CaseRight technologies present an opportunity for firms to increase engagement with plaintiffs from the start of the suit until a settlement is reached, whilst benefiting from best practice online security.

Once a potential class has been identified, CaseRight generates a beautifully designed Certification Microsite; this is a firm-branded online application facility designed to promote the suit and to capture high quality information, supporting documents and other evidence related to a claim. The facility generates collected data into our Verification Workspace which is designed to assist the firm manage the process of cross-referencing plaintiff claims against subpoenaed data sources.

Finally, when a settlement has been reached, plaintiffs are invited to the claim phase of the lawsuit. Here, using our secure CaseRight Settlement Claims Portal, each plaintiff is presented with a personalized settlement calculation. The facility allows the plaintiff to nominate their preferred method to receive their settlement monies and this information can be used by the firm or a Settlement Distribution Scheme provider to reconcile and process payments.

What can CaseRight do for you?

Maximize participation by increasing engagement with plaintiffs during the bookbuild or certification phase of your class action. This is done through CaseRight's secure, easy to use, online forms.

Plaintiffs can register and verify their case online, uploading documents and logging key dates in the timeline of their case. CaseRight's Certification Microsites have a best-practice, user-friendly design making the process simple. This actively works to reduce the timeframe of the suit by helping plaintiffs collate and submit their evidence quickly.

CaseRight's cloud-based Verification Workspace provides a dashboard of analytics as evidence is submitted and a full suite of workflow tools designed to help reduce the time spent cross-referencing and verifying submissions.

Finally, CaseRight sends email notifications to plaintiffs when a settlement has been reached, with a link to their personalized settlement facility. Here they can see their unique settlement calculation, confirm their preferred transfer method and accept the firm's terms and conditions.

Here's a closer look at how CaseRight applies to class actions.

Background

In a 2018 example, CaseRight was used for a shareholder class action. It achieved an impressive 92% discovery success rate and saved the law firm a significant amount of time during this phase of the case.

Making a case for shareholders

As is commonplace during shareholder class actions, Computershare Limited as Transfer Agent for the defendant, was subpoenaed to verify claims made by checking that claims corresponded with the Registry at the time in question.

The litigators needed to find a technology solution that could help them to efficiently and accurately collect claim-related documentation and statements from plaintiffs.

Computershare deployed The Reach Agency, a specialist digital development firm that delivers Computershare’s clients high-volume, bank-grade web solutions for equity and finance transactions.

Central to the litigators immediate needs was to have an online facility that made it as easy as possible for holders to register a claim and upload documents and/or key dates that could then be used by Computershare to verify facts for the case.

Reach designed an online solution which could securely collect a plaintiff’s personal details and sensitive case-related information. This laid the foundation for the Reach CaseRight suite of services and led to the full range of features and benefits we offer today.

Situation

It became clear to us that it would have been advantageous if we had used Reach during the bookbuild for the class action. I'm almost certain we would have saved time in this phase and it would have helped us to build early stage awareness with shareholders.

Comments from a recent client and leading law firm.

Figure 1.1 – Overview of a typical class action lifecycle and the process involved in traditional case filings.

The situation for law firms is greatly affected by traditional methods of communication and the existing way of doing things.

The class action lifecycle can be divided into four main stages; certifying the class, notifying others effected, validating all claims during discovery and finally distributing settlements. During each phase, distinctly different business processes are being achieved.

Traditional methods of working through these stages see each phase handled in isolation. The process of promoting the suit and recruiting plaintiffs finishes, then the process of collecting the plaintiff's documentation begins. Each phase has its own timeline and challenges.

There’s a significant amount of the firm’s time spent trying to first connect with those affected, then trying to remain connected with plaintiffs until a settlement is eventually reached.

Reach’s CaseRight provides a full digital suite that can be applied to the class action’s whole lifecycle to automate communication with plaintiffs and achieve time and cost savings for the firm.

The bottom line is that the whole lifecycle could benefit from
process improvements

Understanding the key challenges for law firms.

Increase Settlement

A high priority is to engage with as many potential class action plaintiffs as possible; generally, the more claims received the higher the settlement value that can be claimed.

Reduce Timeframes

There’s a need to meet court-enforced deadlines and to maintain pressure on staff and plaintiffs to avoid long, drawn-out lawsuits that burn a lot of time and resources.

Reduce Drop-out Rates

Making the entire engagement process digital and automated, greatly reduces defective claims and plaintiff drop-out rates. CaseRight's smartphone friendly and highly-branded solutions increase participation rates.

Mitigate Risks for the Firm

It is imperative to collect and handle case-related personal and banking information in line with online security best practices to verify and settle claims with minimal risk to the firm.

Analysis

It's my view that Reach would be of value to any firm looking to establish class action practices or planning to do more class actions going forward.

According to the Wall Street Journal, companies are facing a record number of class action filings driven by easier access to litigation funding and changes to tax regulations. To highlight how this has impacted class action volumes the following analytics focus on securities class actions.

Figure 1.2 Demonstrates a significant growth in securities class actions filed in US federal court from 2016 to 2017.

Figure 1.2 Number of US federal securities class action lawsuits filed per year 2008 – 2017.

2017 404
2016 276
2015 195
2014 169
2013 160
2012 149
2011 187
2010 174
2009 158
2008 209

Source: 'Seeing through the smoke. Securities litigation study' PWC, April 2018; source of below statistics too.

46^%

Growth in the number of securities class actions filed in US Federal Court from 2016 to 2017.

181

The number of US IPOs that occurred in 2017; of those 15 resulted in securities class actions.

39^%

Increase in the number of foreign issuer related securities class actions from 2016.

199

The number of securities class actions that were related to M&A activity in 2017.

CaseRight

Introducing the Reach
CaseRight
Applications & Services

The CaseRight Certification Microsite

The CaseRight Certification Microsite presents a beautifully designed online application facility that professionally represents the firm and formalizes the plaintiff claim process.

The Certification Microsite comes with a promotional landing page for official information about the class action. This facility becomes a centralized online information resource for word of mouth, printed mail, digital marketing, social media and public relations campaigns undertaken to engage with other plaintiffs during the notification phase.

The solution can be tailored to suit a wide range of class action types. It can be used to capture a simple registration or support the upload of evidence in the form of key dates, photos and documents which can later verify claims.

The CaseRight facilities are securely hosted, providing firms with a high-quality solution that ensures the privacy and protection of the plaintiff data submitted.

CaseRight

Introducing the Reach
CaseRight
Applications & Services

The CaseRight Verification Workspace

The CaseRight Verification Workspace is an application for law firms that has been designed to help staff and cooperating subpoenaed parties through the process of verifying claims in a class action.

Firms can benefit from a single location to track and verify the progress of one or more class actions. From the Litigators' Dashboard, a full range of analytics can be seen including the number of claims, the total claims value, the geodiversity of a suit and claims in various stages of discovery.

CaseRight employs best practice time and workload management techniques, making it easy to process claims and communicate with plaintiffs when required.

With CaseRight you can get through this phase of your case much faster, managing staff and plaintiffs simultaneously.

CaseRight

Introducing the Reach
CaseRight
Applications & Services

Claims Administration & Transfer Agent service providers

Leveraging years of experience meeting the regulatory requirements associated with equity transactions, Reach can deliver firm-branded, secured microsites to present successful claimants with a personalized settlement application form to complete the distribution process.

This facility is designed to be easy for anyone approved for a claim to follow. It involves a simple declaration and acceptance process to close the engagement with the firm and to finalize arrangements with plaintiffs.

Designed to support firms independently or to integrate with Settlement Distribution Scheme (SDS) providers, this application provides a plaintiff-facing service for clean data, easy reconciliation and up to date communications.

Since Reach is ISAE3402 certified, you can be assured of best practice confidentiality, security and project governance.

Outcomes

We can definitely see ourselves using the Reach team and these technologies again. Everything has been handled with great professionalism. The data that has been collected is of high quality and Reach have demonstrated that they are committed to finding new ways to add value.

5,400

The number of shareholders on registry at the time of the alleged offence in a recent class action.

3^%

Only 3% of shareholders had email addresses recorded on the registry.

97^%

of shareholders required expensive mailed communications.

1,238

Number of plaintiffs who registered their claim online.

1,148

Number of plaintiffs who were successfully verified.

43^Days

Number of days claims were registered online and verified.

92^%

Discovery success rate

Why Reach

As part of the world’s largest share registry firm, Computershare, we have successfully delivered high-volume, high-value investor web solutions for all the largest banks and law firms in the world. We have delivered over 600+ projects involving complex financial transactions and processing requirements for everyday investors. Our solutions have been deployed on individual deals involving more than 4 million participants and have processed over $70Bn in transactions.

We bring these skills; our experience and our software to each deal so you know you will have the highest quality engagement and retention, access to bank-grade security and maximum levels of efficiency.