Enforcement Office Software: Dublin Cost (2026)

The verdict in three sentences

A Dublin enforcement office with 22 staff gets more value from extending its case management system than from replacing it, because the real time sinks are creditor follow-up and field work. As an order of magnitude for 2026, a creditor portal costs EUR 20,000 to 40,000 excluding VAT and a field evidence app with timestamps and photos EUR 15,000 to 25,000, for a 12 to 16 week project. With 2 to 3 hours saved per clerk per day, the investment usually pays back in under 12 months.

Why extend the case system instead of replacing it

In Ireland, civil judgments are enforced through execution orders handed to the county sheriff, or to the city and county sheriffs in Dublin, while Revenue sheriffs collect tax debts. The offices that handle this work, together with the solicitors and debt recovery firms feeding them, run on a case management system that covers the core well: case files, execution orders, fees, accounts and client money. Replacing it takes a year and carries a data migration risk few managing partners will accept.

The lost hours sit elsewhere. Creditors such as banks, local authorities, utilities and solicitors' practices phone and email to ask where their file stands. In the field, officers photograph seized goods, premises and access attempts on personal phones, email the pictures back and someone re-types the report. Two connected modules fix both leaks.

The modules are built in parallel, so a full project fits in 12 to 16 weeks including a pilot. Most case management vendors offer an API or structured exports: check that first, before anyone prices anything.

What the saved hours are really worth

The 2 to 3 hours claim holds up when you measure task by task. The table below shows typical figures from scoping workshops in a mid-sized office.

The portal absorbs most inbound calls because creditors see the execution date, the documents and collections themselves. The field app removes double entry: the officer dictates observations on site, photos are filed in the right case automatically and the draft report arrives ready for review. Because execution orders only stay in force for a limited period, the dashboard also flags files approaching their deadline.

Legal and technical points to settle early

Three topics must be decided at scoping. The first is evidential weight: it rests on the officer's own observations and signature, and the app does not replace them. It strengthens them by recording for every photo the date, time, GPS position and a SHA-256 fingerprint proving the image was not edited after capture.

The second is GDPR and confidentiality. Debtor data is sensitive and the Data Protection Commission expects proportionate safeguards: EU hosting, encryption, named accounts, two-factor login for creditors, a 12-month access log and retention periods matching the office's own policy. A short data protection impact assessment is advisable.

The third is vendor dependency. The connector must read and write statuses without altering the vendor's database, so that vendor updates break nothing. Technically this is a custom web application of medium to high complexity: on the Kolonell grid, a medium application sits between 4,000,000 and 7,000,000 FCFA (EUR 6,100 to 10,670) and a complex one between 7,000,000 and 15,000,000+ FCFA (EUR 10,670 to 22,870+), with the exact figure set in the quote after reviewing the API.

Mini case study

Ciarán Byrne, managing partner of a 22-person enforcement office in Dublin, employs 9 clerks. Assumed saving: 2 h 30 per clerk per day over 210 working days.

• Hours freed: 9 × 2.5 × 210 = 4,725 hours a year.
• Loaded hourly cost of a clerk: EUR 35, so EUR 165,375 of time.
• Cautious assumption: only 40% of that time is redirected to billable files or collections, i.e. EUR 66,150 a year.
• Investment: portal EUR 30,000 + app EUR 20,000 + connector EUR 8,000 = EUR 58,000 ex VAT.
• Payback: 58,000 / 66,150 × 12 = about 10.5 months.

There is a commercial upside too: a local authority that tracks its 300 files online has little reason to move its book to a rival office.

FAQ

Do we need to replace our case management system to get a creditor portal?

No. A connector costing EUR 5,000 to 12,000 syncs cases, statuses and documents with your existing system. The office keeps its habits and its history.

Do photos taken with the app carry evidential weight?

The weight comes from the officer's observations and signature. The app adds a timestamp, GPS position and a SHA-256 fingerprint to each photo, so any later edit is detectable.

How long until we are live?

Allow 12 to 16 weeks in total, including a 3-week pilot with 2 clerks and 2 or 3 volunteer creditors. Rolling out to the whole office then takes 1 to 2 weeks.

Where is debtor data hosted?

On servers in Ireland or elsewhere in the EU, with encryption, daily backups and a 12-month access log. Creditors log in with two-factor authentication.

What yearly budget should we plan after launch?

Hosting at EUR 150 to 400 a month plus Kolonell maintenance at EUR 53, 114 or 183 a month depending on the level, roughly EUR 2,400 to 7,000 a year.

Let's scope your project. We define the creditor portal, the field evidence app and the connector to your case system with you, on a 12 to 16 week plan. Detailed quote within 48 h. WhatsApp +221 77 596 93 33.