Legal and tax professionals flock to legal tech startups like MeetUrPro, IndiaFilings & Vakilsearch

CHENNAI: Startups that provide an online marketplace for services of legal and tax professionals, including lawyers and chartered accountants, have realised that there is a lot of untapped potential in the sector. In the bargain, they are driving down the price of such services in the virtual world. Thousands of professionals, especially those in small cities and towns, are increasingly becoming part of these marketplaces and find that they gain access to a new market opportunity that is being made possible by the power of aggregation on the internet.

Chennai-based MeetUrPro is one such startup that brings together tax and legal professionals. Started in January 2015 to internet-enable offline tax and legal consultancy, it has over 1,000 service providers listing their services on its marketplace, from individuals to mid-sized companies.

While the idea was to cut geographical barriers in helping companies incorporate, manage their bank accounts as well as receive tax advice through the net, they realised, in the process, that the online marketplace stripped the premium charges associated with such services in the offline market.

"There is a surplus of such experts in tier-II and tier-III cities. Even in a tier-I city, their costs are far lower than that of an organised firm," said Divakar Vijayasarathy, cofounder of MeetUrPro.com.

For example, he said that while the average rate for structuring a salary costs Rs 2,500 offline, the same service can be provided online for about 350.

Enthused by enquiries from startups, MeetUrPro has begun a 'clinic' that will support them right from the incorporation stages to ongoing compliance requirements. MeetUrPro does not charge its service providers—they pay something similar to a service charge though-—but draws its revenue from the consumer. IndiaFilings, another Chennai-based company following a similar business model has trimmed costs by economies of scale, where a cloud-based platform has helped it scale up volumes and drive down costs. "We have about 15-20 developers constantly developing our cloud-based platform to deliver efficient accounting and legal services," said Lionel Charles, managing director of India Filings.

Charles also notes that online marketplaces have standardised prices. "The prices used to vary based on a clients' profile. Today we charge a much lesser and standardised fee," he said. Earlier, chartered accounts would on an average charge around Rs 30,000 for helping the incorporation of a company. The same service is now being delivered by IndiaFilings for Rs 16,000. Vakilsearch, another Chennai-based player that helps in the incorporation of about 400 companies and registers nearly 900 trademarks each month is opening a marketplace too.

The company's trademark registration package costs Rs 2,000 while the same would cost Rs 5,000 offline. Aware of the fact that the key lies in maintaining unquantifiable metrics, such as quality and speed of service. Hrishikesh Datar, CEO of the Kalaari Capital-backed Vakilsearch, said “we only sign on affiliates through referrals. If the word-of-mouth is good, we give it a try. At the beginning, we closely handle the experience so we can evaluate the professional. If we find that we can trust him, the experience is no longer as controlled.”