Product Updates
Events
Support Hub
Lounges

Find answers, share ideas and discuss best practices

Find answers to your questions
Stay up to date on the latest topics
Ask questions and help others

Ask a question

Law Lounges

Find a cozy corner to discuss your interests in our Law Lounges

Smokeball Q&A

Ask the experts and other users about how to make the most of Smokeball

Product Updates

Read about the latest Smokeball features and fixes

Smokeball Social

Get to know fellow legal professionals from around the world

Community News

Everything that's happening in the community right now in one place

Ideas & Feedback

Tell us how to make Smokeball even more useful to you and your firm

Recently active
Help others

JasmineSmokeball Team

Australian Updates & News

Legal Content Update: Traffic Matter Types for VIC and QLD, More Criminal Matter Types, Report Updates and More

Welcome to this month’s update - we have been busy brewing up some handy new features for you in our legal content cauldron! Looking for something in particular? Just reply below and we’ll find it for you or read the full release notes for all the details. New Matter Types for Victoria This month we released the following new Matter Types for our Victorian clients:Traffic Offence in our NEW Traffic Category; Summary Offence; plus Indictable Offence in the Criminal category; Mortgagee’s Consent in the Mortgage category; and Renewal of Lease in the Leasing category.We also amended the existing Solicitor’s Certificate Mortgage (VIC) Matter Type to allow you to act for either the Guarantor or Mortgagor. New Traffic Matter Type for Queensland We also released a new “Traffic Offence” matter type for our Queensland clients in the new Traffic matter category. NSW LRS Forms Update This month also saw the update of over 15 of the existing LRS Forms in the Precedent Library to reflect an updat

543

1 hour ago

WichitaLawyerContributor

General Q&A

Billing - Sorting by Matter or Reference number

I have been asking for years for the ability to sort time and expenses by Matter and now “Internal Reference.” You can sort time and expenses by just about everything else but not these. This would be a huge help when there is a lot of billing on a lot of matters in a single day. Any hope of this becoming a reality?Thanks

4 hours ago

msimowitzContributor

General Q&A

Anyone using Ai software to write demands?

10 hours ago

VictoriaWLCContributor

General Q&A

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

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

1 day ago

AaronContributor

General Q&A

Anyone Have a Law Offices Procedure Manual They'd be Willing to Share?

We’re bringing on a new paralegal/assistant soon and I’d like to give her a manual she can refer back to for common tasks and workflows. I figure I would ask here first since we’re all on Smokeball and that’s going to factor into our procedures significantly.

1 day ago

lcoffeyContributor

General Q&A

Using an Intake Form with an open lead

Hi,I am setting up protocols for using Smokeball’s intake forms, and I have hit a snag. In the case of a client not having an email address (some of our clients don’t), I would like to be able to open a new lead and fill out the appropriate intake form for them over the phone. There is a button called “Internal Use,” but I can’t actually launch the form without entering an email address. Is there a way to not make email address a required field in this context?Edited: typo

7 days ago

VictoriaWLCContributor

General Q&A

Billing a matter as a fixed fee - but allocating time entered to an invoice

We have a couple of matters where we bill pursuant to contracts as a fixed fee - however we always enter our time worked on the matter so we can track where we are sitting against the fee proposal. We never include the individual time entries on the invoice though. The usual process for billing on our old system was to invoice as a fixed fee, then mark the corresponding time entries as “non-billable” so that we could identify how much WIP had not yet been ‘billed’ and how we were tracking against certain stages of the project. I’m wondering if there is a way we can allocate time entries to an invoice - but not show the individual line items and bill as a fixed fee with a one line summary? This would help for EOM WIP reports etc.

9 days ago

sjflaxContributor

General Q&A

Form Libary

In my form library I am having four folders that are being deleted from the smokeball side of things. I then have to restore them. Then a week goes by and they are gone again? Smokeball has not seemed to figure out why, even though I have submitted several tickets. Has anyone else had this problem?

9 days ago

kuhrichSmokeball Team

Run your best firm

Billing 101: Best Practices [webinar recap]

In this month’s CLE, lawyer Jordan Turk shared billing best practices so you can run a modern and ethical law firm. You can watch the full webinar here and download the slides. Check out the presentation overview before you dive in:Part 1: Billing Organization and consistency are key. The longer you wait to bill a client, the less likely they are to pay you. Improving your billing processes and procedures Suggested authorization forms and third-party payor addendums Helpful technology to automate processes How to handle difficult clients Part 2: Collections An overview of aging A/R and why it’s often a silent killer of law firms. Tips on invoice follow-up How to collect on aged A/R Part 3: Surcharging Most states allow for this, but you cannot mislead clients. Check with your local jurisdiction Part 4: Trust Accounts An overview of ethical handling of client funds. IOLTA review Proper separation of earned and unearned fees Part 5: Three-Way Trust Account Reconcil

110

12 days ago

Martha.lContributor

General Q&A

how to void an invoice

I need to void an invoice that I finalized, and create a new invoice. I watched the SB video, and it said to “waive” it, and then the option to “void” would come up -- but that isn’t what happened. Can someone please tell me how to find the “void” button? Thank you in advance.

13 days ago

msimowitzContributor

General Q&A

Anyone using Ai software to write demands?

10 hours ago

VictoriaWLCContributor

General Q&A

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

1 day ago

AaronContributor

General Q&A

Anyone Have a Law Offices Procedure Manual They'd be Willing to Share?

1 day ago

sjflaxContributor

General Q&A

Form Libary

9 days ago

Martha.lContributor

General Q&A

how to void an invoice

13 days ago

lcoffeyContributor

General Q&A

Is it possible to embed a default document in the folders in matter configuration?

I would like to add a spreadsheet template for tracking medical record requests to the “Medical Records” folder that we have set to auto populate when we create a new matter in Personal Injury. I can see how to add custom folders, but not how to have a folder automatically generate this document. Is this possible?

15 days ago

taniatuttleContributor

General Q&A

Outlook Sync Issue

I was using local Outlook and integrating with Smokeball fine; then it started to not catch all my emails and this last week, Outlook started freezing anytime I tried to do anything in Smokeball. So I am trying to do sync Outlook on the web and I chose the Web version of calendar sync and its just stuck on syncing. Its been hours and it won’t let me cancel or disable so now I am stuck with neither working. Its the weekend so SB support not open so hoping someone has some thoughts!

16 days ago

george27Contributor

General Q&A

Change multiple time entries at once

Hi all,My question is:Is it possible to select multiple time entries and change the hourly rate associated to them so this applies to all entries at once?Regards,

17 days ago

VictoriaWLCContributor

General Q&A

Copying document to another matter

We are brand new to smokeball and have a question. When we copy a document to another matter - if changes are made within the new document, the changes are saved back to the original matter’s document it was created from. This is obviously problematic for data integrity. How can i avoid this occurring? Thanks

22 days ago

lcoffeyContributor

General Q&A

"Dates and Deadlines" Widget category disappeared

I noticed that my SOL and medical records widgets were no longer accessible, and when I went to customize, their category, “dates and deadlines,” had disappeared. Does anyone know why this would happen? My staff role has not changed. I also submitted a support request.

27 days ago

Join now

Become a member

Badges

Gigihas earned the badge Founding Member
JG3has earned the badge Smokeball Power User
Melaniahas earned the badge Smokeball Power User
etorreshas earned the badge Smokeball Power User
CarsenTazihas earned the badge Smokeball Power User

Show all badges

What's on

Show full leaderboard

Terms & Conditions

Sign up for best practice advice, tips and to connect with your peers.

Already have an account? Login

Login with your Smokeball account

Username *

E-mail address *

Country *

Password *

I accept the terms & conditions

loginBox.register.email_repeat

Login or create an account

No account yet? Create an account

Login with your Smokeball account

Username or Email

Password

Remember me

Forgot password?

Enter your username or e-mail address. We'll send you an e-mail with instructions to reset or create your password.

Username or e-mail

Back to overview

Scanning file for viruses.

Sorry, we're still checking this file's contents to make sure it's safe to download. Please try again in a few minutes.

This file cannot be downloaded

Sorry, our virus scanner detected that this file isn't safe to download.