Tip of the Week: Using the Time Entry Lock Out Date

Does your firm have a hard and fast time entry policy? If not, you may want to consider using TimeSolv to ensure all billable time is accounted for in a timely manner. Nobody likes it when your senior partner is reviewing draft bills and doesn’t think a particular matter has some time entry that’s needed. Now your admin person is trying to track down that timekeeper and get information on something that may have happened three weeks ago. I’m not sure I remember what I had for breakfast this morning, let alone work I did three weeks ago!

One way around this issue is having a time entry policy that requires timekeepers to do their time entries every day and have your billing admin close out  the previous week each Monday. Now, if there’s missing time or if a timekeeper did not enter their time for the previous week, those issues are found up front, long before a draft bill is created.

Our tip of the week looks at how to use TimeSolv’s time entry lock out date feature to enforce this time tracking policy.

Simply head to the settings section under the Time tab. You’ll see near the top the field where you can enter your Time Entry Lock Out Date. Timekeepers without admin access will not be able to make entries before that date. So if you enter October 8, 2016 only admins can make entries prior to that date, effectively meaning if your timekeepers are not up to date they must talk to the admins and get the issue settled immediately.

We suggest you create a policy where each week is locked on the Saturday or Sunday or whatever day you want to deem as the end of your week. Then your admin should review the previous week’s entries and assure that any missing time is accounted for.

Policies like this will shift your firm’s culture to assure all time is entered in the most timely fashion. This will reduce headaches and tedious backtracking trying to find time entries when you’re generating your monthly invoices.