Using custom-defined fields on Thomson Innovation or Patbase?

I should like to hear about the experience of other users with custom-defined fields, both in Thomson Innovation and in Patbase.

I find that both systems are slow, i.e. it can take up to a minute before fields have been edited and stored. Thomson often gives error messages, mainly in situations where user fields in a number of records are to be changed. Patience absolutely helps here!
Still, it is a very useful tool when indexing manually a not too large set of patents (maybe up to 500)e.g. for more refined statistics (e.g. making a2- or even 3-dimensional matrix).
The new simultaneous 5-folder storage of Patbase is a real bonus, but does not allow a very refined classification of documents. On the other hand, it is practically instaneous.

Again, tricks and tips or other input from my colleagues would be appreciated.

If anyone doesn't know about these features, the PatBase custom user fields are described in the Searchable Datafields section of the PatBase report, and the Thomson Innovation custom user fields are mentioned in the Major Recent Updates section of the Thomson Innovation report and in this press release.