Ebilling For Law Firms Preparation Guidelines

By Catherine Ellis


Keeping track of time and billing it to your clients is a very important task if you are running a law firm. Partners, associates together with other timekeepers bill time in accordance with the directives of their reviewers and their firm policies. If this task is not carried out, you will not bill your clients hence the firm will not be paid. Ebilling for law firms preparation is therefore important in ensuring success.

With the increase in fees, reviewers also become careful on charges. Since they will observe the bill provided to them closely, you need to come up with a transparent bill. A detailed activity description is an important segment of an invoice. It, therefore, should include all the crucial aspects so that a client can easily understand it.

Ensure that you avoid block billing. This refers to the practice of listing a number of tasks in a block summary beneath a single time entry. Most of the consultant recognize this practice as a strategy that disguises inefficiency. In addition, most courts do not allow it as it hinders effective compensation of attorney fees after a judgment. A more efficient way will be to separately itemize every activity together with its corresponding time.

Time should be recorded promptly. Recording the time soon after a task has been completed ensures accuracy. It may be unrealistic to enter every task into the software you use each time it is completed. You, therefore, should develop a system which encourages prompt timekeeping. Alternatively, you may keep a time notebook as a backup to record all tasks by hand and then entering the details at the end of the week.

An important step to take is to go through the noted time entries. The time-sheet you write will show the level of accuracy or sluggishness you put into doing work. As the reviewer is not in a position to confront you because of the errors that are done on the time entries, it can create a bad impression. As a responsible individual, you need to go through it so that you provide free of error details.

You need to use a less complex language. You ought to remember that many of your clients do not have knowledge in law hence may not be able to comprehend difficult terms. Due to this, you ought not to utilize any complicated term when billing activities so that they can easily comprehend the invoice. The reviewer will therefore not ask many questions.

Talk from time to time with your reviewer so that billing problems that may be experienced later on are prevented resulting to a happy consultant. You ought to be transparent from the start. Talk to them about the fee agreement prior to working on the case. To add on this, you need to provide them with a reasonable fee so that problems are prevented. Discuss with them any added expenses, rate increase and additional fees to ensure that your consultants are not surprised.

Lastly, you need to send invoices on a regular schedule. Do not let the bills pile up. Instead, come up with a timetable that you will follow whether it is monthly or weekly. This way, the reviewer can easily comprehend the type of work you have been doing on the case. They, therefore, will not be surprised if you give them a large invoice.




About the Author:



Aucun commentaire:

Enregistrer un commentaire