The fear that stops most migrations is not cost — it is the possibility of losing dispute history mid-round. A staged migration removes that risk entirely.
Stage 1: export and map
- Export clients, contacts, items, documents, and dispute history.
- Map every legacy status to a status in the new system before importing anything.
- Identify fields with no equivalent and decide where they land.
Stage 2: parallel run
Import historical data and run new intakes in the new platform while existing rounds finish in the old one. Nothing in flight is disturbed and the team learns on low-stakes files.
Stage 3: cutover
- Freeze writes in the legacy system on a named date.
- Run a final delta import for anything changed during the parallel period.
- Reconcile record counts and spot-check 20 files across stages.
- Archive the legacy system read-only for the required retention period.
Plan for two to four weeks end to end depending on volume. Most of that time is validation, not data movement.