Conveyancer Update: Injunction granted against Dye & Durham as software battle heats up
Judge guarantees Parnes Rothman LLP’s Conveyancer access until principals launch competitor iClose or end of 2021
For original story, click here: Real estate law firm sues Dye & Durham in conveyancing row
Dye & Durham can not kick a prominent real estate law firm off the Conveyancer platform this year before its founder lawyers have launched their competing product, an Ontario judge has ruled.
Ontario Superior Court Justice William Chalmers’ June 29 ruling bars DoProcess – which was purchased by legal software giant Dye & Durham in late 2020 – from interfering with the Conveyancer access of Parnes Rothman LLP until the firm transfers to iClose, the competing software product under development by the law firm’s principal lawyers.
Alternatively, Dye & Durham will be able to cut the firm’s access under the terms of the interlocutory injunction on Dec. 31, when Conveyancer is expected to be retired anyway in favour of its successor Unity.
The principals of the law firm, which operates under the name Real Estate Lawyers.ca LLP and has one of the highest-volume residential real estate practices in the country, announced the acceleration of their iClose product in January this year, shortly after Dye & Durham hiked the fee per transaction by more than 400 per cent – from $25 to $129.
Justice Chalmers’ ruling says DoProcess then amended the terms of Conveyancer’s end user licence agreement to allow for discretionary termination on 10 days’ notice, before warning the law firm that its access would be cut, complaining that it was leveraging its knowledge of Conveyancer to improve its own iClose product.
Following fruitless negotiations for Dye & Durham’s purchase of iClose, the ruling says Parnes Rothman was suddenly locked out of all its Conveyancer files on June 15, prompting its legal action. The law firm claimed the termination of its access prevented them from closing any of its real estate transactions during one of the busiest periods in its history.
Before Justice Chalmers, Dye & Durham’s counsel argued that the software company was within its rights to terminate the law firm’s access to Conveyancer, claiming that the decision had nothing to do with the collapse of the iClose buyout talks.
However, the judge granted the interlocutory injunction, finding that there was a serious issue to be tried regarding the existence of an earlier alleged agreement reached between the parties.
The law firm claims that an April meeting between its principals and a DoProcess executive ended with a promise not to cut Parnes Rothman’s access to Conveyancer as long as it agreed to switch to iClose when possible, while Dye & Durham says any commitment was non-binding.
Dye & Durham had offered to extend Parnes Rothman’s access until Sept. 1, based on iClose’s January press release, when it said the software would be ready by the third quarter of 2021. However, Justice Chalmers was convinced that the law firm could suffer irreparable harm if it was kicked out of Conveyancer too early.
“It will be unable to close transactions and face exposure if transactions cannot close. If iClose is not available by September 1, 2021, the Plaintiff will be required to transition to a different software program quickly, and then transfer to iClose when that software program is ready. The cost and work involved in multiple transfers to different software programs is significant given the Plaintiff’s very busy real estate practice,” Justice Chalmers wrote, going on to find that the balance of convenience favoured the law firm.
“I grant the Plaintiff an interlocutory injunction preventing the Defendants from interfering with the Plaintiff’s full access to the Conveyancer software platform until the date the Plaintiff transfers to the iClose software, or December 31, 2021, whichever is earlier,” he concluded
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