It's About Time

How to Link Your Saved Documents to Timeslips

One of Timeslips often overlooked features is the Timeslips "View Documents" option found on the Timeslips Client List toolbar and now also inside the Timeslips Client Information if you have Timeslips Premium or Timeslips 2018.  Earlier versions show the icon on the Timeslips Client List toolbar, but not inside Client Information

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So now that you've found the Timeslips "View Documents", what can you do with it?

Here are a few ideas for adding documents to Timeslips :

• Contracts:  
  • Engagement Letters
  • Non-disclosure agreements
  • Fee agreements
  • Final settlements
  • Real Estate Documents
  • Lease Agreements
• Websites: 
  • Client's company website
  • Other websites that might be pertinent to the case.
• Templates:  Easily access Word or other templates that you frequently use, such as:
  • Welcome Letter
  • Payment Reminder letter  
• Expense Receipts:  Link all expense receipts associated with the case.  
• Your Invoices:  
  • In addition to the documents that you can manually link, Timeslips automatically links the PDF files that you create when Generating Bills.  Even if you are printing and mailing bills, I highly recommend that you also print to "PDF" which will automatically file your bills in the correct client folder with Invoice number for easy identification and retrieval.  You can access these invoices from the "View Documents"; "Client Folder".  As mentioned in previous articles, this is the preferred method of accessing previous billings.  Even though the Timeslips "Reprint Bills" option is still available, it does not always have the invoices you are looking for.  

More ideas:

To make it even easier, you could add the templates to the Client Default templates that you use to set up a new client.  

Your options are limitless

 

 

 

 

 

Email Timeslips Invoices

Even though Timeslips has had the "email" invoice feature for several years, I still come across clients that:

• Print hard copies of Timeslips bills
• Scan each of the Timeslips invoices 
• Create individual emails and attach the scanned PDF Timeslips invoice.  

There's a better way.  

At a minimum, print your Timeslips invoices to "PDF" by selecting that option on the Timeslips "Print to" option list.

This will at least eliminate the need to print and scan your invoices just to create a Timeslips invoice PDF file.  Printing Timeslips invoices to PDF is part of my Timeslips "best practices" recommendation anyway.  Even if you still print a hard copy of your Timeslips invoices and file them in a traditional filing cabinet, you should still always print a PDF copy of all your Timeslips invoices.  

If you are already following the "best practices" Timeslips invoice procedure to print invoices to PDF, then you are just a very short step away from completely automating that process.  The next step is to take a look at your Client Information.  Open a Timeslips Client Information file for a client that you want to email invoices.

Notice the "Email Addresses" section at the bottom of the first screen.  Just add the primary email address of the person that is going to be receiving the emailed Timeslips invoices.  You can add "CC's" for additional recipients.  You may even want to email copies to yourself and/or to the attorney that is responsible for the case.  

 Once the email address is entered you are almost finished.  The next step is to  click on the "Invoices" tab in Timeslips Client Information.  You will notice the "Email Options" section.  Simply place a check mark in the "Send bills via email"; save the client and you are all set for the next time you generate a Timeslips invoice for this client.  After you have selected to Approve your invoices, a screen will pop up showing you which clients have been designated to receive email invoices.  At this point you have the option to uncheck any name that you do not want to send an email invoice.  When you click OK, all the clients invoices are generated with the PDF email attachment.  It will also include any "Attachments" that you included with your slips.

Timeslips: Are you "Attached"???

The more recent versions of Sage Timeslips have a wonderful new feature.  You can now "attach" a document directly to a time or expense slip in Timeslips.  

If you weren't looking for it, you may not have noticed the "Attachments" section at the botton of your Timeslips Slip Entry screen.  There are many times when you may need to send supporting documents along with your Timeslips invoice.    If you own a recent version of Timeslips, it is no longer necessary to print the invoice to PDF; scan the documents and add them to the Timeslips invoice to be emailed or mailed to your clients.  You can do it all in one step:

• Enter your time or expense on the entry screen
• Click on the selection button in the Attachment section OR
• Scan the document directly to the Timeslip expense or time slip.  You will need a TWAIN-compliant scanner for this to work.
• Make sure you click on the "Include attachment on bill" option

That's it!  When you print your invoices the attachments will automatically be printed along with your Timeslips invoice.  

One word of caution: You will need to use a specific format when printing bills (see screen print below).  You cannot attach a PDF to printed bills; however, if you are emailing bills, the PDF works fine as an attachment.  

When printing bills to display, you will not see the PDF attachment, however, it does get included with the email as an attachment.

 

 

Goodbye FolderShare...Hello Dropbox

For years I used Microsoft's free product, FolderShare, which is now being replaced with Windows Live Mesh.  I was a big fan since I have computers in both Chicago and Boca Raton and like to keep the infomation identical on both computers.  When traveling back and forth between locations, there is no need to copy or transfer files.  Files were always synchronized within seconds.  It was always assumed that Microsoft would eventually start charging for this "free" service.  That hasn't happened yet.  What's worse is they replaced the FolderShare product with Windows Live Mesh, which requires Windows 7!  Because I support a number of legacy software products, it is necessary for me to keep at least one computer loaded with XP. 

I was very sad to see this happen, however  I found a great alternative...Dropbox.  Dropbox not only syncs my computers, but also stores my files "in the cloud".  It's free for up to 2GB of data.  You get 50GB for about $100 a year.  I gladly paid for the extra space.  It gives me additional peace of mind knowing that I can access all my documents on line as well.  In addition, it also keeps the deleted files and allows you to share folders.  Best of all, Dropbox doesn't care if I'm syncing with a Mac, Windows 7 or Windows XP. 

Find and Open Windows Files FAST!

I have been using QuickJump for several months now and find it an indispensable tool.  QuickJump is brought to you by TechHit, the same people who publish the SimplyFile product for Outlook.  

If you are like me, you have thousands of folders with many more subfolders under those.  Finding and opening a file requires going through several levels:  My Documents; Clients; Client Name; Client Subfolder.  That's a lot of mouse clicking and scrolling.  With QuickJump, you just press CTRL+SHIFT+J.  A window opens where you can start typing the name of the Subfolder you want to go to.  A list of possible folders appear so you can choose something different than the top choice.  So now, to open a folder, you just press CTRL+SHIFT+J, type the first letters of folder until you see the correct one appear and Enter.  Presto!  you are in the correct subfolder without a lot of scrolling and clicking.  It's much, much faster.  They have a free 30-day trial available if you just want to give it a try.  The cost to purchase is just $29.95...well worth it!

Can Law Firms do Business without a File Server?

Can you move your business to the "cloud"?  I just read an interesting article written by Seth Rowland for Technolawyer.  He gives a good overview of cloud computing and how it might impact your practice.  I'm going to try to give you a synopsis of what he had to say.

File Server Costs

When you look at the total cost of ownership, you need to include ongoing operational expenses, maintenance and support agreements.  Factor in the costs of software along with the installation, configuration and training.  The average costs breakdown something like this:

• $8000.00 - Server Hardware
• $6000.00 - Server and Network Configuration
• $3000.00 to $8000.00 - Software for 5 users
• $17000.00 to $22000.00 Total initial costs

• $1000.00 - $3000.00 - Annual Software maintenance
• $2000.00 - $4000.00 - Server Maintenance

• $3000.00 - $7000.00 Annual Recurring total

These fees do not include the intangibles such as security, administration, daily backups, test restores, application of updates and patches and a host of other tasks.

Alternatives

Practice Management:  There are currently four good hosted options:  AdvologixPM, RocketMatter, Clio and HoudiniESQ.  You can try these for free and then pay a monthly fee for each user.  The prices range from $50 to $100 per user per month.

Online Backup:  You have consumer products like Carbonite, Mozy and IDrive.  Business-level software includes JungleDisk, Barracuda Backup Service, Iron Mountain and Rackspace Backup.

There are also hosted options for online document management as well as hosted Exchange server with Blackberry and SharePoint.

So what's the downside?  Security is one of the big concerns everyone has about moving to online data storage.  The reality is that most service providers provide secured encryption data transfer.  The security of a cloud provider is far greater than the network security found in most small law firms when it comes to protection from hackers and intruders.

Data ownership is the other issue.  Your agreement with your service provider specifies your rights to data ownership.  You should read this carefully.  Most provide a mechanism for local backup.

Access Risk:  What if the Internet goes down or the service provider is offline?  The reality is that if the Internet goes down, you will have difficulty conducting business, since so much is done via email.  If your server goes down you could be out of business for hours or days; if your server hard drive fails and you can't recover your backups, you've lost a lot more than just time.  It can take several days for a retrieval service to recover data from a crashed hard drive and there is no guarantee that they will restore everything.  

On the other hand, cloud service providers have up-time commitments that range from 99.9 to 99.999%.  Some even support off-line mode if you are in transit without an Internet connection.  Remote access to the cloud is generally far superior to remote server access.  

CONCLUSION

Cloud computing isn't for everyone, however there are very real benefits:  freedom of movement; pay only for the processing power and storage you need; add up to 100 users; grant secure access to clients via custom portals; there is no need for disaster recovery in the event of a fire or other natural disaster. 

I think most firms will start by trying one or two applications and gradually move more and more of their operations to the cloud.  I encourage you to try out one of the free trials that are offered. 

Lose Your Desktop and Print From the Cloud — Lawyerist

Lose Your Desktop and Print From the Cloud — Lawyerist

The Connected Lawyer » What Going Paperless Means to Me

One of the problems that I have when describing my paperless practice to others is the fact that my practice is not really paperless. I use plenty of paper. In fact, a couple of days ago, I mailed out close to 100 pages of paper in court filings and courtesy copies. Because of this, I have, at times, had trouble explaining exactly what I am talking about.  Read more by clicking on this link:  www.theconnectedlawyer.com

Create Adobe Hyperlinks

The good people at Adobe have created a nice online tutorial to help you create more sophisticated Adobe PDF documents.  In this lesson, you will learn how to:

• Combine several documents in a "binder"
• Use the bookmarks like a table of contents
• Create links within your document as well as in separate documents

Try this tutorial if you would like to sharpen your Adobe skills.

Adobe Online Workspaces

If you use Adobe 9, there is a new on-line service available for you.  Adobe is now offering an online workspace that will allow you to easily collaborate and share documents.  This is good news if you are working with several people on a project.  Instead of emailing the documents back and forth, you can have them in one place where everyone can have access. 

There are some other neat features like web conferencing and PDF conversion tools. 

There is a basic version available for $14.95 a month.