Attorney Michael Wagner can find a document in his Bismarck law office while talking on the phone.

That's pretty good compared to some law offices that have so much paper it has to be placed in storage units.

Wagner is one of the first of a handful of bankruptcy lawyers in North Dakota to take advantage of a paperless system that has recently been implemented by the United States Bankruptcy Court in Fargo.

Wagner, a bankruptcy trustee, submits all of his legal paperwork to the Fargo court electronically.

"I can't file a single piece of paper with the court," Wagner said. "If I do, they will put it in an envelope and mail it back to me."

Although Wagner has been using a paperless system since 2000 to store files, the bankruptcy court in Fargo didn't officially start using such a system until August.

Ellen A. Johanson, clerk of the bankruptcy court, said the system has worked well except for some initial difficulties while in transition.

"I find that it's very handy," Johanson said. "It allows attorneys to do their own filing, and there are fewer envelopes for us to open, which reduces the opportunity for a document to get lost or put in the wrong file."

Each attorney using the technology gets a login name and password to access the bankruptcy court. Once signed in, Wagner can submit documents in seconds and receive confirmation immediately that the court received the records. Because Wagner has a login name and password, documents that would normally require a signature with pen and ink now don't.

The court gave lawyers the option of going totally paperless when they submit documents or to continue to submit with paper.

Wagner works on 80 to 90 cases a month, and each case averages 50 to 70 pages, but some can be a few thousand pages long.

Wagner said his law firm replaces 8,000 or more pages a month using a paperless system, which has allowed him to change the location of his file storage from an 8-by-10 foot-room to a folder in his computer system that can be accessed on multiple computers in his office.

"The convenience to me makes it a no-brainer," Wagner said.

The court offers training sessions in Bismarck and Fargo for attorneys interested in the technology. Johanson said so far the court has trained 60 lawyers, and about one-fourth of those trained are submitting files electronically. She said she would like to see all of the 300 on the court's mailing list to use the paperless system some day.

Some federal courts in other states now require attorneys to file documents electronically.

While he still has to keep some paper around the office, Wagner said over time he expects more and more documents to be able to become paperless.

Starting Thursday, he will no longer have to keep paper checks on file. A new federal law called Check 21 goes into effect that day, which allows banks and other financial institutions to keep only an electronic copy of the check. The legislation will speed up the time it takes for checks to clear.

With all of the paper attorneys deal with day to day, they stand to see a large benefit from a paperless office, but Wagner said many lawyers are slow to get on board. Wagner said paperless systems are more commonly used by other business professionals such as accountants. Government agencies also have made use of paperless systems.

Small businesses can set up a paperless system without much outside expertise. Wagner said all it takes is a good scanner and computer software that will allow for an efficient filing system. Wagner spent $11,000 on a scanner a few years ago, but he said one just as good can be purchased now for about half that cost. He also had to purchase Adobe Acrobat Professional to be able to work with the scanned documents.

Wagner said the system doesn't save him a lot of money, but it significantly cuts down the time it takes to retrieve files.

"Once you've done it, you'll never want to go back," Wagner said.

(Reach reporter Tom Rafferty at 250-8264 or tom.rafferty@bismarcktribune.com.)