Have you ever seen this tiny little image next to a project in your LienPilot, the dashboard for Zlien users?

It might be the most important feature on your LienPilot, and here’s why:

Lien Pilot due dates help you stay compliant

When you enter a new project into your LienPilot, our system asks you a few questions about the project  (What is the project address? Who hired you? etc.) to fuel the lien deadline calculator.  The single most important piece of information about your project is the project address, because this tells the LienPilot in which state your project is located.  Based on the state, the LienPilot’s deadline calculator will determine your lien compliance requirements, as related to state-specific deadlines.

In addition to the project location, there are two other very important pieces of information used to calculate potential deadlines: 1) the date of first furnishing labor and/or materials, and 2) the date of last furnishing labor and/or materials.

The date you first furnished labor or materials usually dictates when your preliminary notice is due, if your state requires that you file a preliminary notice

The date you last furnished labor or materials almost always dictates when your mechanics lien is due.

Once you have put the applicable dates into the system, your LienPilot will match the dates with the project state’s lien laws, and that’s where the “Due in” circle comes from.  This “Due in” circle is how our system tells you when your lien deadline is coming up.

Your project information page should look something like this:

For this particular project, based on the project zip code and the dates I have put in, the LienPilot is telling me that I have 14 days to file my preliminary notices. I also have 88 days to file my Claim of Lien.

I could go into the advantages of filing preliminary notices, or I could tell you why filing a lien is your best bet for getting paid, but I will save you the trouble and just remind you that paying attention to the due dates provided by your LienPilot deadline calculator are the best way to make sure you stay compliant throughout the life of your project.

Written by Martin Roth See original article at Lien Deadline Calculator: Why Dates Are Important Originally posted on the LIEN

If you’ve logged into your Zlien account recently you probably noticed something different.

In a subtle change to our system we have updated our login screen. The new screen is cleaner than its predecessor, and we think it makes logging in slightly more enjoyable than before.  Plus, we’ve added a simple message the encapsulates Zlien’s mission for your business:

Manage your mechanics lien and preliminary notice compliance intelligently, and get paid every time.

Zlien clients know that we’re constantly tweaking and improving our systems to offer you the absolute best technology in the mechanics lien and bond claim space. Stay tuned for more improvements.

Written by Scott Wolfe Jr See original article at You’re Not Crazy – Our Login Screen Has Changed Originally posted on the LIEN

Preliminary Notice and mechanics lien compliance is a challenge for building material suppliers and subcontractors across the country. More than a legal compliance challenge this is a credit challenge.

We’ve talked about credit challenges in the past on this blog. In fact, I would call it a general theme of this blog.

We’ve discussed Credit Policies and the importance of integrating a lien policy within such credit policies.  And we’ve talked about credit and collection remedies outside of the lien instrument, such as promissory notes, personal guarantees and joint check agreements. There’s a huge explanation why this blog – titled the Lien Blog – focuses so much on credit.

It’s because the mechanics lien instrument and compliance procedures are simply another credit tool.  It just so happens to be the most significant credit tool in the construction industry (my view). Let’s start with some basic principles:

1) Your company should use the mechanics lien and bond claim laws to protect your rights as part of its credit management and procedures.

2) Your company should outsource this compliance, because in-house compliance is complex and riddled with technical traps.

Complying with the mechanics lien and bond claim laws requires that you send all required preliminary notices, track those notices and track your deadlines. Now the question is simple – who should you partner with to help you with this compliance?

This week, Zlien published a report comparing its preliminary notice services with NCS Credit.  This post gives some highlights of this comparison, explaining why Zlien is the Smart Choice for your company.  Zlien v NCS Full Comparison Page.

Zlien’s Flat Fee Pricing Leads Industry In Simplicity & Reasonableness

If you set out to compare Zlien and NCS Credit’s preliminary notice services one thing is going to jump out at your right away: NCS Credit’s pricing is an absolute mess.

Preliminary compliance is complicated enough. When we started Zlien we made it a goal to simplify the process, from soup to nuts.  That meant creating a pricing structure that wouldn’t leave your credit team pouring over invoices at the end of each quarter trying to figure out what the charges meant.

[pullquote style="left" quote="dark"]More than constructing a simple pricing structure, Zlien made patent-pending technological innovations to make preliminary notice compliance more automated, and thus, more affordable.[/pullquote] More than constructing a simple pricing structure, Zlien made patent-pending technological innovations to make preliminary notice compliance more automated.  This has two important ramifications:  (i) Mistakes in notices and compliance are mitigated or eliminated; and (ii) Compliance is more affordable.

For these reasons, NCS Credit cannot compete with Zlien on price, efficiency or accuracy.  While Zlien offers a flat no-nonsense per-project fee of $27.00 to send an unlimited number of notices, with all postage included, NCS Credit charges anywhere between $35 – $170 per project to send notices with postage an additional fee!  Go ahead and take a look at their complicated and expensive pricing structure.

There is a striking difference between Zlien and NCS Credit on price.

The Web’s Most Beautiful Interface For Mechanics Lien and Preliminary Notice Management

Zlien’s LienPilot system is the most beautiful and functional in the industry.  The system helps you keep track of project documents, certified mail returns, legal standards applicable to your project and, perhaps most importantly, lien and notice deadlines.

Screenshot from Zlien’s LienPilot application showing a list of projects and their next actions, which consist of lawsuit and lien filings.

This allows you to monitor everything that has been done and everything that must be done to comply with the mechanics lien laws, and it visually identifies to you what is the next step.

There’s simply nothing like the LienPilot offered by any of our competitors, including NCS Credit.  NCS Credit offers clients a collection of “Publications/Software,” including their “LienTracker NTO” and “National Lien Digest.”  The offerings, however, do not take advantage of the technological advancements over the past 10 years, nor do they compare with the comprehensive Zlien application.

See this article for a discussion of some key differences between the National Lien Digest and Zlien’s lien resources: Free National Digest of Lien Laws.

The interface differences between Zlien and NCS Credit are striking, as Zlien has committed years and hundreds of thousands of dollars to innovate the most comprehensive and functional mechanics lien compliance management application. Zlien has made it beautiful, and simple, too.

With Zlien, The Answer Is Always Yes

The answer is always YES with Zlien.  Go ahead, give it a shot.  Ask us and then ask NCS Credit about whether any of the following is included in their flat-per project fee:

The most striking difference between Zlien and NCS Credit is a difference in perspective. Zlien is interested in your company’s bottom line, and we think we’ve technologically solved the mechanics lien and preliminary notice problem so that you can proactively solve your accounts receivable headaches, and secure all of your receivables.  It’s our intention to help your company do this without nickel and diming you, and without complications.

One flat fee – the answer is always yes.  Zlien is the Smart Choice for your company.  Get a proposal today to see how we can help your company.

Written by Scott Wolfe Jr See original article at Zlien v. NCS Credit – A Comparison Originally posted on the LIEN

If you’re in the construction business then you’re in the credit business, and until recently, that meant having all types of tricks up your sleeve to reduce your company’s credit risk on every furnishing. These tricks include getting personal guarantees, running credit checks, negotiating joint check agreements, purchasing credit insurance, purchasing check guaranty services, and more.

Mechanics liens and bond claims are an option, of course, but compliance with the segregated and complex rules is tough.  Accordingly, your company has always prioritized the other credit tricks over lien claims. That should change.

Preserving Your Mechanics Lien Rights Is Better Than Any Other Credit Protection

Everything you do to manage credit risk is great and every little bit helps. Nevertheless, there is no better credit mitigation tool than the mechanics lien, and that’s because preserving your mechanics lien rights means you have iron-clad payment security on every single project.

This is especially true for material supply companies. These companies frequently furnish materials to a subcontractor, who is hired by a general contractor, who is getting money from a property owner or developer.

If a suppliers mechanics lien rights are preserved they would have security for payment unless a complete catastrophe hits the project and its parties.

First, the project itself must be upside down, with more debt (that trumps your lien right) than equity in the land. Because of the priority many states give lien claims and how careful banks are these days to not over leverage a property, this is rare.

Second, every single party above you must go bankrupt: the subcontractor, the general contractor and the property owner.

It’s possible for this perfect storm to hit, but highly unlikely.  As a result, if your lien rights are protected you’ll be in a very good position to collect your debt.

Managing Lien Compliance Is Possible With Zlien and the LienPilot

The trouble with utilizing mechanics lien and bond claim remedies has always been the difficulty and cost of compliance with the complex regulations which change depending on your state, project, tier and more. Zlien, however, has committed tremendous resources to solving this problem for the construction industry, making lien compliance easy and affordable.

If you have a hundred or a thousand projects in a single month, the Zlien system can handle it.  We’ve done it for other high-volume suppliers and contractors and we can do it for you.  The best part about this is that we can do it for you without adding anything to your existing workflow.

Your company need not do anything new.  You simply go about business as normal and Zlien will tap into your existing workflow or system, preserve all of your lien rights, monitor all of your deadlines, and give you a login to our slick interface that helps you control, view and manage everything.

Learn more about our Preliminary Notice and Lien Deadline Tracking services here.   And if you’re unsure about whether outsourcing this is right for you, read the 4 Reasons Its Smart To Outsource Your Preliminary Notice Work.

Written by Scott Wolfe Jr See original article at We Can Manage Lien Compliance For Hundreds Of Projects Originally posted on the LIEN

Our clients have many different powerful uses of the LienPilot’s “Locations” feature. This post provides you with a tutorial on how your company may use this powerful feature.

Manage Notices and Liens For Different Branches or Offices

One of the most popular ways clients use the LienPilot “Locations” feature is to associate projects with different branches or offices. Separating projects by branch is critical not only to help organize that data internally, but more importantly because your preliminary notice or mechanics lien may legally need to identify the correct branch.

If your company does business in New York and Los Angeles, for example, it’s possible your mechanics lien or preliminary notice would be challenged if it identified the claimant as having the New York address when the work was actually furnished through the Los Angeles office.

You can create a location record for each of your company’s branches within the LienPilot. Not only can you sort and filter projects, deadlines, filings and notices by location, but you’ll also insure that each notice or lien filed through Zlien will identify your company and your company’s contacts properly.

Manage Notices and Liens for Different Brands or Companies

Some companies operate using multiple names or brands with a single parent company or management company. Zlien’s Locations feature accommodates these situations as well.

You can create a location record for each of your brands or companies. As indicated within the image to the left you can set up an “Alternative Name” with the location entry.  Here you will input the unique name for your company or brand.

Any projects associated with that location will be associated with that location record’s “alternative name.”  So, if your company does business as both Wolfe Electrical Company and Wolfe Electrical Supply, your mechanics liens or preliminary notices will read the appropriate name depending on the location selected.

Don’t worry.  If you leave the “alternative name” field blank, it will use your default company name.

Use Locations To Segregate Lien and Notice Data For Different Components Of Your Business

If you don’t have multiple locations or brands you may still find the locations feature useful to segregate the data within your LienPilot interface.  Some of our clients have two components to their business.  Say, for example, painting and drywall work.

You could create a location for “Drywall” work and another for “Painting” work.  Then, when viewing deadlines, projects, orders, claims or other data within our system, you could filter or segregate the data based on this criteria.

Yes, You Can Assign A Different Login for Each Location

The LienPilot is a multi-user environment, and this multi-user function is powered by the Locations feature. Whether or not you actually have separate locations or brands, you can use the Locations feature to set up different login accounts for employees or credit managers.

If you want an unique login for a location or branch, just add a contact, email address and password for that location.  The location or branch will use that email and password to login.  They will be able to view all projects associated with their location only.

If you don’t have a location or branch set up you can simply create a new location for whichever employee you want to login.  When adding the address and telephone number just be sure to use the same address and phone number for the main account. Then, add the contact name, email and password for the user you want to set up.

Yes, We Can Invoice Each Location Separately

Sometimes, locations, branches, brands or others pool resources but keep their books separate.  Accordingly, we can let a single company or parent company take advantage of lower bulk prices by pooling their work together, but still invoice and bill them separately.

Each location is invoiced only for the projects and orders affiliated with their specific location.

How It Works

Let’s get down to the nitty-gritty on how this feature works.

First, you’ll need to set up your locations. The two images already used in this post show you the screens to do this.  The first step appears at the top left of your LienPilot login screen. Click on the “Add Location” button and you’ll see the options to add, update or delete locations.”  The second step is to add your location data, which will be inputted into the screen also above-provided.

Second, you’ll need to associate your project with a specific location.  You can do this when entering any project into the system.  The screenshot to the left of this text shows you the dropdown menu that will appear within your “Add Project” screen whenever your account has locations associated.  Just click on the location associated with the project and they will be connected.

Finally, as you can see from the below screenshot, you’ll now be able to filter data within the system based on the location associated.  Just click on the dropdown from any screen and select the location you want to filter.

Written by Scott Wolfe Jr See original article at How To Use The LienPilot’s Locations Feature To Manage Liens and Notices for Multiple Branches, Brands and More Originally posted on the LIEN

How awesome would it be if you could calculate all of your mechanics lien and bond claim compliance by inputting a few simple pieces of data about your construction project?  Meet Zlien’s LienPilot.

Add A Project And Calculate Your Mechanics Lien Requirements

Using the LienPilot to calculate your project’s mechanics lien compliance requirements is so easy we can show you everything you need to know in under a minute.  Here’s a video doing just that:

Signup For Free and Add A Project Today

Ready to use the world’s most advanced mechanics lien compliance management system?  It’s free, and easy.  Just sign up for a free account and add your first project.

Our free plan allows you to manage up to 15 active projects which is a heck of a lot considering: (i) All archived projects are not counted; and (ii) Projects are not counted if you order any Zlien products for the project (such as a notice or lien).

And if you have any questions you can contact us at anytime.  We’re happy to help.

Written by Scott Wolfe Jr See original article at Add A Project And Calculate Mechanics Lien Compliance Requirements In Seconds Originally posted on the LIEN

Have a question that needs to be answered by the Zlien team?  Easy.

This could be a question about nearly anything: an existing order, an inquiry about Zlien services, how to place an order, and so on.  When logged into the LienPilot, you should see a support tab on the left-hand side of the page.  Simply click the Support tab and type your question into the box.  This will automatically get sent to us and filtered to the correct department.  You’ll get your answer fast.

Don’t have a LienPilot log-in?  No Problem.

Write us an email (mail@zlien.com).  These messages are automatically filtered to the correct department as well.  Should you wish to create a log-in to help manage your projects, orders and questions, click here to open a free LienPilot account and achieve complete mechanics lien zen.

Where Do My Support Messages Go?

Zlien and Zendesk – a match made in heaven. Our fanatically great customer support is powered by Zendesk.

You may be wondering what happens after you send us a message.  This is a great opportunity to give kudos to one of our vendors, Zendesk.   Zendesk is a ticket support and management system we use to coordinate electronic communications with our clients and our web visitors.

When you send a request to us by email or through the Support tab, the Zendesk system very intelligently analyzes the request and connects it with the correct department here at Zlien. Notifications go out to our team, and they get a response to you.  Your response is emailed, but you can also login to your LienPilot account and click on the “Support Tickets” link at the bottom of the dashboard. This will show you all new, closed, solved and pending support tickets.  If you have multiple people in your organization, we can connect your accounts and allow anyone from your organization to comment on any one else’s tickets or monitor the same.  Your correspondence with Zlien, therefore, is always accessible and organized.

We love helping our clients and our visitors as much as possible. Unsure about something? Go ahead and click the support page.  We’d love to help.

Written by Jennifer Smiley See original article at How-To Create A Support Ticket Originally posted on the LIEN

Accounts receivable and credit management is a challenge to anyone in the construction industry, which boasts the highest debt ratios in the nation. While the mechanics lien remedy exists in every state as a possible solution to these ARM problems, compliance with these regulations is a tall order.

Zlien provides software and services to help organizations manage mechanics lien and preliminary notice compliance. Today, it announces a complete overhaul of its industry leading LienPilot web application, making lien compliance easier and more beautiful than ever.

Tour The New LienPilot

How LienPilot Helps You Management Preliminary Notice Requirements

Call it what you will – preliminary notice, pre-lien notice, notice to owner, NTO, prelims, etc. – the fact is that companies struggle to understand what notices they should send and when. The confusion is understandable, as these requirements and forms vary from state to state and project to project.

The LienPilot application deconstructs the confusion and puts you in control of the mechanics lien process. Clients and users can enter simple project information into the LienPilot software, and the system will calculate what notices are due, when they are due, and track your deadlines and requirements through the interface.

Watch this video to see how easy it is to enter project data through the new interface and immediately see the applicable notice deadlines and requirements.

Industry Leading Management of Filed Notices and Liens

Sending preliminary notices or filing mechanics liens is difficult enough…but perhaps more challenging is tracking these documents. Does your company have immediate and digestible access to all of your notices, liens and claims?

The Zlien LienPilot application makes management of this information and these documents easier than ever. When the time comes for your company to prove it sent a notice, you’ll be able to pull up the project, all lien and notice rules and regulations, and most importantly, every notice sent and record of delivery.

Multiple Branches, Regions, Brands or Accounts?  No Problem.

The launch of the new LienPilot sees the graduation of our “Locations” feature, which is something we’ve been testing in Beta for almost a year.

The locations feature lets any user set up multiple locations, branches or brands. If your company manages its projects separately by branch, or if your company operates under multiple company names or brands, the LienPilot interface can handle the distinctions and associate each project and deadline record with the appropriate ”location.”  If desired, each location can have a separate login.

Written by Scott Wolfe Jr See original article at Mechanics Lien Zen: Introducing The New LienPilot Originally posted on the LIEN

Zlien never stops innovating.

It’s a mission we’ve followed since first opening our doors, and further evidence of this comes through the Beta testing of the 4th generation of our LienPilot application, which manages lien filings and deadlines.

“The new LienPilot is blowing our customers’ minds,” says Scott Wolfe, CEO of the company. “We’ve spent years developing the technology to make lien compliance simple, and all those innovations are finally come together in this release. Companies large and small will be better off with this offering.”

Why?

The Most Useful Lien and Notice Data You’ve Ever Had

The new LienPilot manages your preliminary notice, mechanics lien and bond claim data like never before. The interface is now broken into five categories: Projects, Orders, Deadlines, Collections and Claims.

Click into any of these sections and you’ll see a dynamic listing of the applicable data. This data has tons of filters. Filter the data by customer, by branch, by project, by type and more. Plus, you can search through the data as easily as you would google search for a movie’s show times.

In addition to the data filters and search ability, the new LienPilot allows you to star important projects or claims.

The New Lien Pilot Answers: What’s Next?

Ever wonder what comes next in the mechanics lien or bond claim process? Wonder no longer.

The mechanics lien and bond claim process is an absolute nightmare. Take it from us. Over the past five years we’ve worked diligently to crack the code in these laws and map their logic. If you don’t have a system, you’ll never be able to reliably figure out what comes next in the process of protecting your lien and bond claim rights.

The LienPilot 4 solves this completely.

Our interface tells you clearly what is next, and taking the next step is as easy as clicking a single button. We promise that you’ve never seen anything like it.

Intelligently Manage Your Claims.

You shouldn’t have to remember what projects have outstanding claims and when those claims expire. The new LienPilot understands this, and takes care of this for you.

Login, click on the “Claims” tab and view a listing of all your outstanding claims and how much you’re owed on each. Search them or filter them by criteria. Star the ones that are important. And don’t worry about them expiring on you, because Zlien automatically calculates the foreclosure and enforcement deadline for you.

The LienPilot 4 Is Available Today

Anyone can access the new LienPilot 4 by clicking on the “Switch to Beta View” link at the top right hand corner of the existing interface.

“When is the last time your preliminary notice service did something innovative?” asks Wolfe. “At Zlien, we are innovating constantly, pouring time and money into developing patent protected technology to help companies get paid.”

Don’t settle for less. It’s 2012 and the lien and bond claim process can be easy. It’s easy with
Zlien. Lien Smart. Get Paid.

Written by Scott Wolfe Jr See original article at We’re Beta Testing The LienPilot 4 – Notice and Lien Management Never Better Originally posted on the LIEN

An email is sent to the user after a completed order. Each email has a link to download the order documents. No sign-in is required. You’ll be sent to a secure document download center.

One of the biggest benefits of using Zlien to process your preliminary notices and mechanics liens is that you won’t need to keep track of so much paperwork. Everything is handled by our system, and all of your lien documents are stored on our secure server.  You can download them anytime.

Here is a how-to on finding, downloading, printing or otherwise saving your preliminary notice and mechanics lien order documents.

Get Your Documents Emailed To You

First, as shown in the screenshot image at the top of this post, you’ll get an email after your order is completed containing a link where you can download the order documents. Clicking this link will bring you to secure, dynamically generated page where you can view and download all order documents.

No login is required to view your documents on this page.

You will only be able to view the documents associated with this one order on this page, and not all of the documents associated with your orders.  The email is sent to the address associated with your account.

Sign Into LienPilot And Download All Documents

(1)  Log into the Lien Pilot here.

(2) Click on the Project in question from the drop-down menu at top.

(3)  Click the link “Document Center” which is beneath the bright blue bar at top

(4) Enjoy a print-out of any document that you wish!

Feel free to contact a team member, at any time, by emailing us mail@zlien.com or calling 866-720-5436

Written by Jennifer Smiley See original article at How-To Find Order Documents Originally posted on the LIEN