Time recording that survives the bill

Attorney at Work quotes an ABA Legal Technology Report figure on late time recording: time not entered the same day loses 10%, time left to the next day loses 25%, and time left to the end of the week loses 50%.

Getting the time down is only the first test. Every entry then has to get past the partner reviewing the bill and the client reading it. An entry that cannot be explained at either point is written off or queried.

Time recording as you work

• Start a timer when you start the matter, even if you think the task will take ten minutes, as Nonbillable's tips put it.
• Record in six minute units. One unit is a tenth of an hour, the same across everyone in the firm.
• Enter the day's time before you leave, not at the end of the week.
• Record all of it. The billing review decides what to write off. Time cut before it is recorded leaves no trace the work was done.

Short tasks are where time goes missing. A two minute email is still a unit. Record each one as it happens, rather than rolling a day of emails into one vague entry before you leave.

What gets cut at the partner's review

At the pre-bill review a partner decides what goes on the invoice. Entries that make that decision hard are the ones that lose time:

• time recorded against the wrong matter and not moved before billing closes;
• an entry with no narrative, or one that just repeats the task type;
• one entry covering several unrelated tasks, which cannot be trimmed without cutting all of it;
• a whole morning entered as one round figure, which reads as reconstructed.

LCN's guide to time recording adds the timing problem. Time on the wrong matter has to be transferred before billing closes. Once the bill has gone out, fixing it means going back to the accounts team.

What the client reads

The narrative is the only part of an entry a client sees. It has to say what was done, to what, and for what purpose. Nonbillable gives the model: "Call with other side to discuss and agree outstanding points on security agreement", not just a call with the other side.

1. Start with the action: drafted, reviewed, negotiated, advised.
2. Name the document, the party or the issue.
3. Say what the work achieved, when it achieved something.
4. Leave out internal shorthand. The client cannot decode it.

Three entries, rewritten

• "Emails" becomes "Reviewed vendor's amended special conditions and emailed client the two changes affecting settlement."
• "Research" becomes "Researched the notice period required to end the lease early, for advice to client."
• "Call client" becomes "Call with client to take instructions on the settlement offer and its deadline."

Record time you will not charge

LCN's examples of non-chargeable time include business development and legal research. Record it against a non-chargeable code rather than leaving it out. It shows where the rest of the day went, and it tells you what a type of matter really takes the next time you quote for one.

What late entries cost in a year

Take a lawyer charging $400 an hour who loses half an hour a day to entries made late or not at all. Across 230 working days that is 115 hours, or $46,000 a year. These are example figures, not a benchmark.

Entering time costs time as well. Attorney at Work describes a partner who worked out that her own time entry took the equivalent of $30,000 of billable hours in a year.

The end of day check

1. Open today's entries and check each one has a matter and a narrative.
2. Compare them with your calendar, sent emails and call log for the day.
3. Add anything missing while you still remember what it was.
4. Move anything on the wrong matter now, not at month end.