The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio's electronic filing system streamlines the process of creating, filing and noticing legal documents by permitting attorneys in selected civil cases to file documents with the Court and deliver them to opposing parties directly from their computers using the Internet. It has the potential to provide substantial savings to attorneys, their clients and the Court while improving access to Court records.
Systems requirements are minimal and inexpensive.
In addition, attorneys may need a scanner for imaging documents to be filed electronically that are not available in electronic format. Unfortunately for those who might otherwise prefer Microsoft Internet Explorer as their Internet browser, that software does not work with the electronic filing system and is unsupported at this time. To file electronically, attorneys create their documents on their computers just as they normally do. Instead of printing the document on paper, however, attorneys save it in a portable document format that can be read by others with all formatting intact regardless of the type of computer or word processor they use. Attorneys then access the electronic filing system through their Internet provider over the World Wide Web.