Skip to main content

I want to give myself and my associate attorney billable hour “credit” for the time we spend in consultations, so it will show up in my Time reports. Should I create a Matter called “Consultations”? The PNC does not exist in Smokeball until they become a client (they stay in Lawmatics), but I still want to track the time. How do you guys handle that?

Hi Abigail,

 

I think creating a matter for Consultations is a great idea.  Other firms have also created matters of type Administration where the client is your firm.  You can do either to track your time.

Abigail, in our firm we create a “pending” matter - that way if the consult converts to a hire any time spent is automatically attached to the correct matter.  We used to have a generic consult matter but it got too messy tracking details/calendaring appointments and found creating the pending matter made more sense for our firm.   We can also run reports on how many pending matters we have, track their conversion, etc.  

If you already have the info in Lawmatics and want to manage the “pipeline” there - I think a “generic” Consultations “client” may be a workable solution. I have that and then move the meeting to the correct matter IF/when they hire. It also allows for me to include paid consultations and look at time/return statistics on consultations using the SB matter insights & other reports. 

Terms & Conditions