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Matter Description vs Matter Type - is this an issue your firm deals with?

  • 21 November 2023
  • 5 replies
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V
Userlevel 1

Our firm typically acts for government departments and have many of the same matter type i.e Advice or General type matters, with different matter descriptions i.e:

[Client - Government Department Name] - [Matter Type - Advice/General] - [Matter Description: Appeal re 1 Smith St] 

We are finding that the matter description does not populate in most of the SB interface as default  - In widgets such as “recent matters” or “new matters” “tasks” and in the reporting function – for instance matter lists – the description of the matter is not populated and the only identifying difference is the matter number – which is not very helpful for easy identification purposes.  Similarly, in Billing, in the Invoices tab, invoices are grouped via debtor, and matter type – and the description is not populated in a column for easy navigation. So when we have a particular client with a more than 1 matter – it can be confusing as to which matter relates to which.

Surely we aren’t the only firm to have this same type of issue, wherein firms have many of the same recurring type matters, with the same client. How do others navigate around this issue?

I don’t think it would be hard for SB to have the matter description being the data that is populated into widgets over matter type. 

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Best answer by JG3 22 November 2023, 15:24

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J
Userlevel 4
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Heck yes, this has been a problem for us. Since day one with SB.  Indeed, we identified it a long time ago for a feature upgrade, that SB would automatically default to the “description” in widgets and billing, etc.  Hopefully that’s in the works somewhere….

In the meantime, we get around this as best we can when creating new leads or matters by customizing the information under the “info” option. 

 

 

Thereafter, we override and customize the ‘internal reference’ and ‘description’. 

 

 

That ‘internal reference’ does indeed appear on widgets and various lists and reports, so it’s a backhand way to get at how you want selected clients and/or matters to appear for internal use (but it really mucks up the notion of simple numbering for recordkeeping).

Nonetheless, it remains cumbersome to create batch invoices when you have clients that have multiple open matters of the same matter type.  Unfortunately, unless I’m missing something, when creating invoices, you can’t sort by description or client, as they aren’t separate fields in the invoicing application, nor can you sort by “client&matter”, b/c it’s not sortable….so we have to rely on eyeballing the internal reference number….which can be an error-prone endeavor.

Also in billing, as you probably know, you can create and customize your invoice templates so the invoice document leads with your customized “description” as below.  It makes it clearer to the client and all parties.

 

 

Thanks for bringing this up.  Maybe others have other tricks and tips. 

Ultimately, hopefully we gain some traction on an upgrade!

J
Userlevel 6
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Improvements in this area have been requested at least a couple of times in the last several years - I seem to recall requesting programmatic descriptions by matter type and the ability to select between matter title and description on a per matter type basis. To date I have not heard of this being on a product development roadmap.
 

My use case is high volume evictions for regular clients - it would be helpful to automatically include street and unit address in description along with tenant name and then default to description for evictions. 

Sara Sultan
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Userlevel 7
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Great news, folks!!!!  A recent release offers new options for invoice title and subtitle.  You can now choose from fields for the Custom Text option.  Check it out!  The fields are limited for now, but please share what others you may be interested in.  We need to keep if fairly broad as it needs to work for all product tiers from Bill to Prosper+.

 

 

Sara Sultan (she/her)
J
Userlevel 6
Badge +1

please share what others you may be interested in

 

[Property Card - Property Address]

V
Userlevel 1

Heck yes, this has been a problem for us. Since day one with SB.  Indeed, we identified it a long time ago for a feature upgrade, that SB would automatically default to the “description” in widgets and billing, etc.  Hopefully that’s in the works somewhere….

In the meantime, we get around this as best we can when creating new leads or matters by customizing the information under the “info” option. 

Thereafter, we override and customize the ‘internal reference’ and ‘description’. 

That ‘internal reference’ does indeed appear on widgets and various lists and reports, so it’s a backhand way to get at how you want selected clients and/or matters to appear for internal use (but it really mucks up the notion of simple numbering for recordkeeping).

Nonetheless, it remains cumbersome to create batch invoices when you have clients that have multiple open matters of the same matter type.  Unfortunately, unless I’m missing something, when creating invoices, you can’t sort by description or client, as they aren’t separate fields in the invoicing application, nor can you sort by “client&matter”, b/c it’s not sortable….so we have to rely on eyeballing the internal reference number….which can be an error-prone endeavor.

Also in billing, as you probably know, you can create and customize your invoice templates so the invoice document leads with your customized “description” as below.  It makes it clearer to the client and all parties.

Thanks for bringing this up.  Maybe others have other tricks and tips. 

Ultimately, hopefully we gain some traction on an upgrade!

Thank you for taking the time to explain your experience and provide useful work arounds.  Very helpful!

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