Copier Leasing for Law Firms, Built for Confidentiality and Case Deadlines

A law firm's copier is less a copier than a scanning and document station. Incoming mail, signed agreements, discovery productions and client files are scanned, named and filed into a document management system. Briefs, exhibits and binders are printed in large batches, often duplex, often on deadline. Corporate law firms add transaction work: closing sets, signature packets and data-room uploads that run to hundreds of pages at a time.

That pattern puts the most strain on the document feeder and the scanner, not just the print engine. A machine that prints fast but scans slowly becomes the bottleneck the night before a filing.

• High-volume scanning. A single-pass duplex document feeder scans both sides of a page at once, which matters when you scan thick productions every week.
• OCR and searchable PDF. Look for a machine that can scan straight to searchable PDF so files are text-searchable the moment they land in your document system.
• Secure print release. Jobs are held until the user signs in at the device with a PIN or badge, so privileged documents don't sit in the output tray.
• Large-job handling. Big paper capacity, stapling and hole-punch finishing help with binders and exhibit sets. Bates numbering is usually applied in your PDF or litigation software before printing; the copier needs to handle the long print jobs that follow.
• User or matter codes. Many models let users enter a code before printing or copying, which helps you track usage by person, practice group or client.

The monthly payment is only part of the cost. Before you sign any copier lease, check how many pages are included, what each extra page costs, whether the payment rises every year, and whether service and toner are billed separately. Firms with heavy litigation months should look hard at overage rates, because a single large production can push a month well past its included pages.

Ask, too, what happens to the data on the machine's internal storage when it is returned, and get the answer in writing.

Printree leases office copiers with one fixed monthly payment that covers the machine, on-site service, parts, labor and toner. Plans run $209 to $349 a month and include 5,000 black-and-white and 500 color pages. Pages beyond that are $0.01 for black-and-white and $0.07 for color, so a heavy month is easy to predict.

You choose a 36, 48 or 60-month term. Delivery and installation take 3 to 5 business days anywhere in the country, which suits firms opening a new office or replacing a machine before a trial.

We lease Ricoh, Konica Minolta, Canon, Xerox, Sharp and Kyocera. Each brand makes office multifunction models with fast duplex scanning and secure print options. We recommend a model based on your page volume, scanning load and the features above rather than pushing one brand.