A while ago, a report was published that focused on what legal consumers want, and on how they choose the law firm that will solve their legal issue for them. One of the criteria legal consumers considered was whether law firms accepted online payments. So, if you are not already doing so, the time is right to start looking into it, as it offers a competitive advantage. And if your law firm management or accounting software can automatically process online payments, things are more convenient and effective for all parties involved.

So, how do you get started? When you want to accept online payment, it is important to know that there are several different payment modalities available. People typically want to pay with a service provider that they are familiar with. They may prefer a service like PayPal, or want to pay by credit card, or by wire transfer, and they expect your law firm to be equipped to handle all of these requests. Now, there was a time when all of this made accepting online payments rather cumbersome, but that is no longer the case. You can simply employ the services of a third-party solution provider that functions as an intermediary. They have all the payment facilities in place, and will accept the payment for you, and then transfer it to your account. There are several such providers available, like Stripe, Google Wallet / Google Pay, Apple Pay, etc. In this article, we will take a look at Mollie, www.mollie.com as an example.

Mollie is based in The Netherlands, and its services are available all over Europe. At present, approximately 90 000 European businesses use their services. Mollie can accept payments from all leading payment methods, locally and internationally. The way it works is that they accept the payment for you, using the payment method your clients prefer and/or are accustomed to, and in the currency of their or your choice. Once the money has been received, you can choose when you want Mollie to put it on your bank account. Whether you receive it the same day or the next working day may depend on your bank.

To get going with Mollie is easy and fast. They even claim you can start accepting online payments within 15 minutes. Once you are signed up, accepting online payments is easy to set up, as you can use any of their existing form templates, which are available for free. They offer plugins for existing platforms, like WooCommerce, Magento, NodeJS, PHP, Prestashop, Shopify, Ruby, Python, and others. (Their website gives a full list). If you are not satisfied with these existing forms or plugins, it is perfectly possible to create your own. Mollie offers a well-documented API, which makes it reasonably easy to program your own forms. If your law firm uses a Dutch of Belgian software program for its accounting or law firm management, chances are your service provide will already have its own Mollie compatible forms in place.

The question that next rises in any lawyer’s mind, is ‘What does it cost?’ The answer there is that it really depends on the payment option the client chooses. Different credit cards, e.g., charge different percentages and may or may not charge an additional transaction fee. Mollie offers a complete overview of the pricing on its pricelist. They offer volume discounts, as well as the option for recurring payments. Also good to know is that you only pay for transactions that are successful, and that payments are secure. Fraud detection and prevention is included in the service package.

Mollie also comes with a mobile-friendly dashboard. From the dashboard, you get a detailed overview of your payment reports, complete with graphs that allow you to compare payments at a glance. You can also decide who on your team you want to give what access to your dashboard so you can work together with other members of your team. The Dashboard also is the place to process and keep track of refunds.

In short, there are many benefits to using Mollie. It is easy and quick to set up, and customizable to your needs. You get your own personal account manager and have access to a full-fledged support service. And chances are it is already integrated in law firm management software.