Law Technology Today From the ABA Legal Technology Resource Center
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We recently hosted a Sage Timeslips webinar “Let your Control Freak Flag Fly” for everyone who needs to make sure their law firm’s billing gets done exactly the way that they need it to be done—and we’ve made that webinar available for you to view on demand, here. During the webinar, we shared how different people at your firm can benefit from the time-saving features of Sage Timeslips and we asked the audience to vote on the features they loved the most. So, as promised here are the results of the voting—and there are some surprises here, even to us.
We showed our first set of features in the context of a solo lawyer who was missing out on billed time because he was scribbling time on sticky notes and napkins, along with spending far too much time chasing down clients to pay. To help this lawyer, we shared:
- Individual Preferences—so lawyers (and any other timekeeper or administrator) can set up Sage Timeslips exactly how they need it
- Time Capture—allows timekeepers to enter their time from anywhere, anytime, and on any device with internet access
- LawPay—which integrates Sage Timeslips with LawPay and other common payment apps
Of this first set of features, our panel was placing the best odds on votes for Time Capture, and as you will see we got that one right by a big margin. Time Capture was by far the most popular with our audience, though all the features had a pretty good showing:
Our second example was a paralegal at a small law firm who found herself far too busy having to enter time for the attorneys on her team when they didn’t have the chance to do so—and even when they did, she had to spend almost as much time cleaning up what they did. To help her we showed three more popular features:
- Abbreviations—you can set up abbreviations that will automatically expand into words and even phrases for both yourself and your firm to save time and avoid spelling and grammar mistakes. No more typing in “Telephone conference with client”, just type “TCC” for a consistent result every time!
- Multiple rates—set your rates, connect them to the right timekeeper/client/matter/segment, and let Sage Timeslips do all the heavy lifting for you
- eCenter—our online billing center lets you capture your time in real-time, from anywhere, anytime—and right on time (have we used “time” enough in this sentence for you?)
Our panel of experts was admittedly betting big on eCenter because it’s cool and shiny—though we should note here that no actual money changed hands during the webinar . . . as far as we know. This is good because we would have lost that bet to the dark horse that is Abbreviations. Maybe we should have known better that sometimes the simplest features can be the most powerful.
Our final persona was a mid-sized regional powerhouse law firm billing administrator. We all know someone like her, able to magically turn chaos into order. To help our victim of her own success keep her magic act going, we let our audience in on three more features:
- Custom Sort—the power to customize every single part of your client billing exactly the way you need to with just drag and drop ease
- Client Fund Rules—so you never again have to worry about retainers or other rules for each client and matter every time you set up a bill—just set it once and forget it
- Sage 50 and QuickBooks Integration—so your law firm accounting system and Sage Timeslips work seamlessly together
Maybe we were trying to make up for our missed prediction on eCenter, where we might have gotten too caught up in the cool and shiny versus the steady and reliable, but the prediction here was that the votes would go Custom Sort. This time we got it right, and by a good margin too. We guess it all comes down to that “Control Freak” thing—the control that lawyers and those who work with them need to get their work done the way that they know they need it to get done accurately and in the little time they have.
We appreciate all who were able to attend. If you’d like to check out the webinar and experience these features for yourself, you can watch it here. Or contact us anytime for a personal demo.