Before you migrate: housekeeping, trial migrations and sign-off

Download the before you migrate checklist (Word) Download the trial migration validation checklist (Word)

The usual sequence

Every vendor names the stages differently, but a well-run migration usually looks like this:

1. Housekeeping: the firm tidies its current system so that what moves across is complete, correct and worth having. Start weeks before the first trial, not the week before go-live.
2. Trial migration 1 (the accounts): the money comes first, because it has to be right to the penny. Client ledgers, office balances, unpaid bills, work in progress and unbilled disbursements are migrated and reconciled against reports from the old system at the same date. Expect problems: finding them is the point.
3. Trial migration 2 (accounts again, plus more): the accounts are migrated again with the fixes from the first trial, so you can prove they stayed fixed, together with the custom data and documents agreed in scope. Fee earners check their own matters, precedents are generated and workflows run on migrated data.
4. The final migration: run to the real cut-over timetable, ideally after a dress rehearsal, with a written go or no-go decision against criteria agreed in advance.

Housekeeping that makes every trial cleaner

Whatever is open, half-finished or unexplained in the old system arrives that way in the new one, where it is harder to fix. The work falls into a few areas:

• Client and office account: every bank account reconciled; no client ledgers in debit; suspense ledgers emptied; residual balances on closed matters dealt with under the SRA Accounts Rules; old unpresented cheques and unbanked receipts resolved; costs for agreed bills transferred.
• Bills and debtors: draft bills posted or deleted; part payments allocated to the right bill; credit notes raised; bad debts written off rather than migrated; and, if you use a separate accounts package, its unpaid invoices matching the practice system.
• Work in progress and disbursements: unrecoverable time written off, non-chargeable time recorded as non-chargeable, and supplier invoices paid or cancelled, so matter values mean something on day one.
• Contacts and matters: duplicates merged; records reshaped to fit how the new system models people and organisations (joint records, for example, are handled very differently between systems); finished matters closed; leavers' matters reassigned; matter types checked, because they drive workflows, precedents and reports.
• Documents: emails and documents in personal folders filed to their matters, and duplicates removed.
• The odd things: unfinished corrections, half-completed transfers and custom transaction types. Declare them early; they are the items that stall trial migrations.

What I have seen go wrong on the firm's side

• Housekeeping left too late, squeezed in alongside month-end by an accounts team that is already stretched.
• Nobody owning sign-off. Everyone assumes someone else checked the figures.
• Reconciling totals, not matters. The overall client balance agrees, while two ledgers are wrong by the same amount in opposite directions.
• Fee earners not looking until go-live, when it is too late to fix their custom data, key dates or precedents calmly.
• "The vendor will sort it out." Vendors migrate data; only the firm can say whether it is right.

What I have seen go wrong on the vendor's side

• Extracts arriving late or incomplete, sometimes because the outgoing vendor is slow to help, which compresses everything that follows.
• Undeclared surprises: custom transaction types, years-old corrections and unexplained balances found during the trial rather than before it.
• Decisions not made: work waits while the firm decides how to split a record or treat a balance, and the timetable slips one day at a time.
• Scope growing between trials: new custom data or document requests after the first trial, without the time to map and test them properly.
• Trial results not reviewed in the agreed window, so the next trial starts on unconfirmed foundations.

What both sides get wrong

• A go-live date fixed before the first trial, so every problem found becomes a threat to the date rather than a reason to rehearse again.
• The second trial treated as a formality. It is where you prove the fixes held and that custom data, documents and precedents work together.
• No shared issue log with an owner, a decision and a retest for every problem.
• No agreed tolerance. For client money, the only tolerance is none.

Sign off each stage on evidence

1. At each trial cut-off date, save the reports from the old system: client balances by matter, office balances, outstanding invoices and aged debtors, unbilled work in progress and disbursements, and the bank reconciliations.
2. Reconcile the headline figures first (contacts, matters, client and office balances, outstanding invoices, unbilled time and disbursements, each aged report by band), then the control accounts and VAT in your accounts package, then matter by matter, not just in total, and have the COFA sign off the accounts.
3. Spot check a sample of matters in detail: some chosen at random, some targeted at the riskiest, and a new sample for every trial. For a few, compare every ledger transaction, not just the balance.
4. Have fee earners and supervisors check their own live matters: custom data, key dates, documents and a precedent or two.
5. Keep every issue in one log until it is fixed, retested and closed.
6. Go live only when the written criteria are met, and keep read-only access to the old system for queries and your accountant's report.

The before you migrate checklist turns this into a working list, from planning and housekeeping through both trial migrations to the final run, with space for owners and dates. The trial migration validation checklist covers the headline figures, the matter-by-matter comparison, a random and targeted spot-check sample, and sign-off. For the last month, use the one-month countdown checklist.

We help firms plan and run their housekeeping, manage the vendor through each trial migration, and make sure every stage is signed off on evidence, independently of any vendor.