Law firms tracking revisions in COVID-19 government restrictions during the reopening phase view tech-based solutions as their best bet for keeping clients up to date about changes dropping on what seems like a daily basis.

"All clients are probably struggling with a lot of the same challenges — strategically, operationally and legally — for planning to reopen," said Akerman partner Beth Alcalde in West Palm Beach, the firm's Return to Work team leader. She specializes in employee benefits.

In response, the team launched a Return to Work Resource Guide, which is a client-facing web portal containing policies, questionnaires, procedures and other documents to transition workers back to work.

To be sure, some law firms were already leveraging technology to address the coronavirus pandemic's business impact as travel bans and stay-at-home mandates were issued. Some initially questioned whether client-facing portals were useful or simply marketing tools.

But Elizabeth Espín Stern, a Mayer Brown partner and member of the firm's COVID-19 global response team, said technology is a useful tool for easily sharing with clients the restrictions of a lifted shutdown and how the mandate impacts their industry. She leads the firm's global mobility and migration practice in Washington.

Mayer Brown released its Global Traveler Navigator to track travel shutdowns issued by governments to stem coronavirus spread and other web tools to assist clients.

The firm followed up the first navigator with April's Global Stimulus Navigator, an analysis of major economic stimulus measures, and Back to Business Navigator, an interactive map illustrating state and county restrictions for specific industries.

Stern noted the Back to Business Navigator was needed to deliver reliable, consistent and "easy-to-digest information to clients because they were starting to look at a multitude of issues."

She also said the firm views public reopening mandates as announcements that can be easily revoked if COVID-19 begins to spread again in specific places. As such, the tech platform is a useful tool to keep clients updated about quick-changing requirements.

Kimball Parker, president of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati's software developer subsidiary SixFifty, agreed shutdown reversals are being introduced rapidly and can be expensive for companies to understand and respond to.

"A company could spend tens of thousands of dollars on an assessment and within a week the policy could be out of date and the assessment is moot based on developments," Parker said. "This is not a situation catered to a static document, and with technology you can update things and blast it to a bunch of users. That makes so much sense in this situation."

While SixFifty released two web-based tools to assist companies working during shutdowns, Parker noted the company also developed automated assessments and policies for companies bringing employees back to work.

Those documents include a return-to-work assessment and policy, a daily employee ready-and-willing to return to work survey and a daily employee questionnaire to ensure infected employees don't come to work.

Though SixFifty leveraged technology and WIlson Sonsini employment lawyers' expertise to develop automated assessments and policies, Parker noted COVID-19 is an unprecedented event that no company or general counsel can compare to.

"This has never happened before, and so what that means is the attorney has to generate that document from scratch, and that dramatically increases the cost as opposed to working from a template. That makes it really expensive," he said.