Neal Astbury (Heritage Wills & Trusts) discusses some of the main reasons he uses WillSuite, how it helps him compete with larger firms and why the software has been a delight to work with.

Heritage Wills & Trusts is a Northampton-based will writing firm, founded by Neal Astbury in 2001. For over 20 years, Neal has been providing a friendly and uncomplicated estate planning service for his clients. With over 30 years of experience in the industry, his client's are quick to recommend his services.

"We would highly recommend this company. Neal was a pleasure to discuss our Wills with; he was very knowledgeable and answered all of our questions. We would not hesitate to advise people to use his services."

When the world became reliant on both digital and online processes back in 2020, Neal researched, discovered and began using WillSuite to help him maintain the level of service his firm was known for. Now in 2026, we sat down with Neal to learn all about why he continues to use the software and the value it provides his firm.

WillSuite and Heritage Wills & Trusts

To kick off the discussion, we asked Neal to talk about what the software does well:

“I love that it's all in one place, a complete back office. The help section is really good. So if ever you feel the need to get in touch with you guys, you always get back to me; that is a really nice thing that people need to know. There's support there. Very quick feedback.”

He then expanded on this point, highlighting the value of WillSuite's back office features:

"The thing I think WillSuite has grasped better than all of them is the whole back office. It runs your whole business if you want it to. And that's what really helps me, because I can literally walk out of a client's house, push a button, and it's on the printer when I get home. But that's one of the big selling points, is that everything's very quick and immediate, and just the time saving of it is worth what we pay for it, really."

We then asked Neal for his thoughts on some other areas of the system:

“Really, really love the homepage. Everything's in front of your eyes, everything. Your next appointments and even where you're getting your business from.

WillSuite offers a complete and customisable Client Relationship Management experience. The system has been developed with estate planning professionals firmly in mind:

“So what I love about the system and what I would be happy to let people know is how quickly you can get a case done. If you get your letter templates right and you get your CRM features right, it's such a quick system. Because you see where everything is very clearly, click on it, and there are your letters done. I mean, seriously, you're talking about 5 to 10 minutes to have a case put out, ready to go. And that's with everything on the system. Once they're done, it’s brilliant. It's really, really good.”

On the topic of CRM filters, an area of the system that allows you to customise the data entry fields you input into client cases:

“The CRM filters work really well as well. One thing that keeps us going quite a lot is that we've got a contract with an investment firm. And it's just their local branch, but we pay commission to them. So that's all in the filters, and you click, and there they all are.”

Clauses were another standout element of WillSuite for Neal:

“The clauses, I'll be absolutely honest with you, you're really on top of that. That's your business. I trust it.”

He went on to highlight how efficient the system is for quickly producing additional documents for clients his firm has dealt with previously:

“And also, since having this system, because of the mirroring across is so easy for LPAs, to everything else, it's just, if you've missed that in the past and you've got those in the system, click, done.”

Pipelines are one of WillSuite's key and valued features. It allows users to completely manage and oversee multiple processes across their business, whether it's a pipeline for a client's case or the documents they are producing for them. Built with many intelligent features as standard, the most popular feature offered by pipelines is the ability to automate the communication they send out internally or to clients via sms and email.

“The pipeline feature is huge. I love the fact that it takes you through the case pipeline, so I can see where we are with the case. I love that it reminds me where we are in the process. So we can look and check that everything is being done correctly. And if things haven't been sent back, they're there. But once it goes to completion, it moves on to asking the client for a Trustpilot review. And that’s started to come through for us, which is great. And we only literally did that last week? I think we've got three already. But it's nice when it does it all for you, isn't it?

Neal also goes on to praise one of our recently released features, WillWatch:

“WillSuite has really helped me just recently because I've done a campaign using WillWatch, because you forget when things are over three years old, don't you? So I've managed to catch up on those things, which is really good. I think it's really good to let people know, has anything changed? That's a great question. But we always get more business from those situations, always. Things do change.”

To conclude our discussion, Neal talks about WillSuite's ability to compete with bigger firms, and why one-man bands should consider using the system to increase their productivity, save time and improve their client experience:

“I do believe in the system, and I would recommend the system to anybody, particularly people like me, I think. The big boys are going to have it all sorted, and they'll either do their own thing or they'll do it through you. But there are a lot of people like me out there. They don't realise how hard they're making their jobs.”

WillSuite is one of the fastest growing legal tech businesses serving the estate planning sector. We have grown our to where we are now thanks to the support of users, a fantastic development team and the excellent software we offer. The system supports thousands of firms nationally, has drafted over 2.2 million documents to-date and is professionally endorsed through our partnership with The Society of Will Writers.

So whether you're a one-man band or a larger estate planning firm, get in touch with our team today to learn how WillSuite can make you more efficient.

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