Today's issue of TL NewsWire covers legal billing software with automatic time capture (see article below), an online marketing service for lawyers who don't have time to write articles for their blog, an iPhone calendar app, and a gadget that works in conjunction with an iPhone app for tracking the location of anything. Don't miss the next issue.
DON'T LET BILLABLE TIME SLIP AWAY
Consultants and lawyers both dislike the billable hour, but for completely different reasons. Consultants want lawyers to slap a price tag on their services (e.g., $3 million for an antitrust lawsuit brought against you by the government — appeal not included). By contrast, lawyers think the billable hour works just fine given the unpredictable nature of most legal work such as litigation. But lawyers dislike keeping track of their billable time.
Sage Timeslips 2014 … in One Sentence
Launched earlier this month, Sage Timeslips 2014 (Timeslips) is billing software designed principally for law firms.
The Killer Feature
The new version of Timeslips includes a companion Windows application that automatically tracks your time in the background as you work. Timeslips can organize the collected time by application (e.g., Google Chrome, Microsoft Word) or by custom groups that you create (e.g., client/matter). You can exclude applications such as games from being tracked.
You can create time entries for all active windows on the fly before closing them. You can also display all unbilled activities. For the latter method, you can combine related time captures using drag and drop with your mouse (e.g., time spent working on the same brief at various times over the course of a day).
Other Notable Features
Last year, Sage added a calendar to Timeslips. In the new version, the calendar now syncs with other computers as well as with your smartphone and tablet (syncing doesn't require Microsoft Exchange).
Timeslips' new Slip Entry and Slip List features are designed to enhance your billing workflow by streamlining both the creation and review of time entries. Slip Entry places everything require for a time entry into one dialog box. You can create presets for the most common settings. The Slip List enables you to review time entries by date range, client/matter, etc. This enables you to see if you're within budget, and quickly approve or adjust time entries so that you can create and send bills.
If you use QuickBooks or Sage 50 for accounting, you can take advantage of the new Sage TAL Pro, which provides bidirectional data transfer and an audit trail. This technology eliminates the need for double entry. The audit trail enables you to see all data transfers and reverse any if necessary. You can designate what to transfer and whether it should occur automatically or manually.
What Else Should You Know?
Timeslips runs on Windows Vista or later. Pricing for new customers starts at $499.99 for one computer with volume discounts available. Upgrade pricing starts at $399.99 for one computer. Learn more about Sage Timeslips 2014.
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