Sarah's Law Firm

How ScanSnap helps Sarah's Law Firm go paperless

ScanSnap Customer Story: Sarah Ostahowski, Owner and Attorney, Sarah's Law Firm

Video Description: This customer story features Sarah Ostahowski, owner and attorney of Sarah's Law Firm, discussing her estate planning and elder law practice, her entrepreneurial journey, and how ScanSnap supports a paper-light, efficient workflow. The video includes interview footage of Sarah speaking in her office, scenes of her working with documents and clients, and background music throughout.

[00:00 - 00:03]

Visual: Sarah Ostahowski sits in her office. Text and branding identify her as a customer featured in the story.

Sarah Ostahowski: "Quite frankly, people move at the speed of trust."

Audio: Soft background music begins.

[00:03 - 00:20]

Visual: Sarah speaks from her office.

Sarah Ostahowski: "I focus my practice entirely on estate planning and elder law. So, we write wills and trusts and powers of attorney, and we help people navigate through long-term care and nursing home care and things like that."

[00:20 - 00:37]

Visual: Sarah continues speaking. B-roll footage shows her out and about with her family at a meal.

Sarah Ostahowski: "My grandmother actually had Alzheimer's and passed away from complications of Alzheimer's. And I remember the family going through all of the difficulty of trying to figure out what to do when she suddenly couldn't make decisions anymore."

[00:37 - 00:44]

Visual: Office footage and shots of Sarah working.

Sarah Ostahowski: "That's where we want to be able to step in and go, 'We're here for you. We can help you and we can help your family and we can help guide you through the process.'"

[00:44 - 01:00]

Visual: Sarah speaks directly to the camera.

Sarah Ostahowski: "Every time somebody heard that I was starting my practice out of law school, they went, 'You can't do that.' It kind of became my mission at that point in time to teach people and help people realize that they don't have to follow someone else's path."

[01:00 - 01:13]

Visual: Images of Sarah working in her office and serving clients.

Sarah Ostahowski: "You can define your own success, and my definition of success looked very different than theirs. Why do you have to work like everybody else? Why not start something new?"

[01:13 - 01:26]

Visual: Footage of documents being scanned and digital files viewed on a computer screen.

Sarah Ostahowski: "ScanSnap is part of absolutely everything that we do here. We deal with so much paperwork that it feels on the outside like it's transactional, and you need to make the feeling be intimate and relational."

[01:26 - 01:38]

Visual: Office workflow footage showing paper documents and digital organization tools.

Sarah Ostahowski: "It's taking it from that yellow pad that we have worked on forever and taking it into a digital environment where now the sky's the limit."

[01:38 - 01:46]

Visual: Sarah works at her desk in a modern office environment.

Sarah Ostahowski: "I mean, I don't even have a copy machine here."

[01:46 - 01:55]

Visual: Team members collaborate and organize documents digitally.

Sarah Ostahowski: "If we are really focused on making things quick, efficient, easy, and organized for the team, then our clients experience something that's quick, efficient, easy, and organized."

[01:55 - 02:00]

Visual: Sarah speaks while office footage continues.

Sarah Ostahowski: "I don't have to have a whole bunch of file cabinets. I don't have to hold on to any original documents that clients give me. I can give them all back, and I can work from anywhere."

[02:00 - 02:08]

Visual: Additional office and workflow footage.

Sarah Ostahowski: "If you're trying to start your own business and you want cost savings, get your ScanSnap and start. Make it easy from the beginning."

[02:08 - 02:14]

Visual: Sarah smiles and laughs.

Sarah Ostahowski: "Without ScanSnap, I don't know what we would do, to be quite frank."

Audio: Light laughter.

[02:14 - End]

Visual: ScanSnap logo appears on screen followed by "ScanSnap Customer Stories" branding.

Audio: Background music continues and fades out.

_{Sarah Ostahowski knew that for her clients’ experience to be different, every facet of her law firm needed to reflect a more modernized, welcoming atmosphere. Here’s how Michigan-based Sarah’s Law Firm, with four locations, serves clients better with a ScanSnap-backed paperless system.}

Modernizing Law with a Paperless, Customer-First Culture

In 2020, at the height of the COVID lockdown, Sarah Ostahowski, lawyer and owner of Sarah's Law Firm, opened her inbox to a rush of emails. There was a big case, and larger, established firms were scrambling. Locked out of their physical offices, they couldn’t access important files. The case was tied to these documents.

“About ten minutes later, I sent them everything they needed,” Sarah recalled. No other firm involved in the case had the paperless system like Sarah’s. Because her operations were paperless from the start, she didn’t miss a beat.

Launching a New Kind of Law Firm

“We focus entirely on estate planning and elder law,” said Sarah. She gained first-hand insight into the hardships estate planning can place on families when her own family navigated her grandfather’s dementia. Since opening in 2011 in a small Michigan town, Sarah’s Law Firm has expanded to four locations, including one a few hours from Detroit.

Sarah has been using ScanSnap scanners since she opened. As they open new locations, they buy new scanners for each site. She says she hears about all the issues in her firm, but that ScanSnap technology is never one of them. “I’ve had our scanners for years, I rarely have to replace a scanner,” Sarah notes.

We don’t have stacks of files anywhere, as soon as it comes in, it gets scanned, it gets saved, and we’re done. That’s an extra step we take out.

Sarah Ostahowski Founder, Sarah’s Law Firm

From the Start: One-Step Scanning, Smart Integration

The firm depends on ScanSnap document scanners for digitizing all of their files. Paper stacks, she says, slow down work, collaboration and profitability. “We don’t have stacks of files, anywhere, as soon as it comes in, it gets scanned, it gets saved and we’re done. That’s an extra step we take out. If you want to increase profitability, you have to have the systems, and ScanSnap has made it possible,” Sarah advised.

At Sarah’s Law Firm, all scanned documents are uploaded to OneDrive and directly connected with their client management software, ScanSnap partner, Smokeball Legal Software®. The Smokeball integration brings up the client directory, then we select a client, and pick what file it needs to go in and is stored, explains Sarah.

Whether it’s IDs, receipts, notarized deeds, or family photos for estate planning, the firm scans it all, easily and securely. They go a step further, “We ask families to bring photos of themselves so we can connect their faces to their names and estate, and add those digital photos to their files,” Sarah says.

Standing out with Mobile Scanning

Sarah’s team meets clients where they are, quite literally. Law firm scanning solutions, which include mobile scanning, are essential to her business. Using their ScanSnap iX100 portable scanner, the group can go onsite and securely digitize documents from anywhere, instantly.

“We work with farmers. We’ve met them outside the barn, scan their documents on-site and hand them right back,” says Sarah. The technology saves significant time and steps for the firm.

We work with farmers. We’ve met them outside the barn, scan their documents on-site, and hand them right back.
Sarah Ostahowski Founder, Sarah’s Law Firm

Collaboration Across Sites

With four locations, responsive communication is a key part of what makes the firm successful. The firm has only one phone number that rings to all of the offices. With their ScanSnap scanners, their administrator in Texas can immediately begin working on a file just scanned in Michigan.

“If you hire one of us, you get all of us. That’s a big space where having our ScanSnap has been awesome. Everyone has immediate access to everything that is happening within the offices, if we didn’t have such a great system to be able to scan and file, we wouldn’t be able to do what we do with the amount of locations that we have and the upkeep we have with our team. It’s been instrumental in what we do; without it, life would be much more difficult,” explains Sarah.

Searchable PDFs, AI-Ready Workflows

Sarah’s team ensures every document is scanned as a searchable PDF. OCR for legal documents supports AI readability and workflows. In keeping on top of documents in the busy firm, Sarah says that making documents readable ensures they don't have to go back and fix things later.

“When we can set that as a default setting, then we don’t have to think about it either.” Our goal is to not have to backtrack,” she advises.

If we didn’t have such a great system to be able to scan and file, we wouldn’t be able to do what we do with the amount of locations that we have and the upkeep we have with our team.
Sarah Ostahowski Founder, Sarah’s Law Firm

Advice for Other Law Firms: Paperless Law Office

From an attorney’s perspective, one of the best features of ScanSnap is the auto-duplex scanning. Sarah says it’s such a simple, but powerful feature. Law firms lag behind in technology, she observes, and legal document scanners that feature duplex scanning are a must.

Sarah emphasizes that starting paperless from the beginning was key to her success. In addition to her law firm, she also teaches law office management: “This is one of the very first things I tell them you need. If you can start paperless, you want to do it. If you’re already running with paper and you want to switch to paperless, start now. There’s no better time and no better equipment than ScanSnap.“

Learn more about how ScanSnap can help your firm serve clients faster, more securely, and with greater accuracy.

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Customer Story

How ScanSnap helps Sarah's Law Firm go paperless