When a lawyer makes the decision to make the jump from being an attorney, to managing their own practice, they absolutely need to consider their legal accounting. Rarely do lawyers have accounting expertise and accountants who understand all the intricacies and regulations associated with legal accounting may be hard to find. Every law firm needs access to a legal specific … Read More
Tech Tip #37 – Billing Is More Than Just Part Of The Closeout Process
Many firms don’t consider billing until they are finishing up their work with a client. Successful firms have billing in mind from day one when they first engage with a client. Your time and expenses are both billable, so recording them as they occur is the most effective way to reduce leakage associated with poor billing practices. Practice management in … Read More
5 Ways To Prevent Legal Accounting Errors
For so many small and medium sized law firms, legal accounting is a major challenge. Lawyers certainly aren’t accountants and accountants rarely have the specific expertise needed to successfully navigate the legal accounting landscape. Unfortunately, this creates the perfect storm for legal accounting errors to occur at many small and medium-sized firms. We all know that legal accounting errors can lead … Read More
Tech Tip #36 – Your Firm Will Make Mistakes With Billing, Here’s How To Handle Them
As good as your firm may be, chances are it probably isn’t perfect- especially when it comes to billing. It’s ok we all make mistakes. If your firm accepts credit cards those mistakes can be more challenging, as payment, voids and chargebacks take place in billing system but the funds are deposited or withdrawn from an accounting system. Manually reconciling … Read More
Attorneys Only Collect 84% of What They Bill Clients
We work with law firms across the country. We see everything from established firms to firms who are just starting out. Something that we notice quite often is that attorneys are attorneys first and business men/women second. While this is the ideal order for clients looking to hire the best legal representation, it isn’t always the best thing for the … Read More
Tech Tip #35 – Organize Your Firm’s Email By Matter To Get The Most Out Of It
When a law firm takes on a client and their legal matter, there is a great chance that multiple people inside the firm will be working on that matter. As a result, emails concerning that matter can be scattered across multiple inboxes inside the firm. Looking for information from email correspondence concerning the matter can be extremely challenging. CosmoLex makes … Read More
Email Access & Security For Law Firms
In my last post, I discussed organizing your firm’s email communications by the matter they are related to. This is a great way to ensure that all pertinent information concerning a specific matter can be found in one place. This will allow all of the attorneys and other legal professionals involved with this matter to easily track down the information … Read More
Tech Tip #34 – Legal Research Is Important, So Is The Time You Spend Doing It
Don’t let some of your most important work go unbilled. Attorney’s jobs go far beyond the courtroom. I’m sure you spend countless hours on legal research to get the very best results for your client. The problem is that many firms and attorneys have difficulty recording and billing for the time they spend on research. CosmoLex and Casemaker have partnered … Read More
Corralling Your Law Firm’s Emails
Maybe more so than in any other profession, attorneys have a great understanding of the importance of being able to follow a paper trail. It’s something many attorneys do while working for their clients to simply get the best outcome. While many lawyers can sift through their client’s financial documents or contracts with little to no problem, corralling their emails … Read More
Data Entry Errors & Your Law Firm
When you set out to start your own law firm you probably considered many things. Where you could find clients, attorneys to work alongside, office space, how to manage your financials, and much more. All too often firms fail to consider how their firm will handle their data entry process when it comes to legal billing and legal accounting. How Data Entry … Read More