Law Office Technology

TimeMatters - Out of the Office Email

File --> Setup --> General --> User Level--> Email --> Set Inbox Options

1. CHECK the box, "Check for new messages every ___ minutes".
2. CHECK the box, "Start Mail Agent at System Setup".
3. This will UnGray "Out of the Office". Click on the "Out of the Office Tab".
4. CHECK the box, "Enable Out of the Office Responder".

You can now setup the subject and the email for your out of office message.  This is much easier then setting it up in outlook.

TimeMatters Certified

Sorry for the delay in postings.  I took some much needed vacation time in Chicago this past week. And, this week I became TimeMatters Certified.  I will start posting about TimeMatters in the upcoming weeks, but Wells Anderson has a really good blog at: http://www.activepractice.com/1234tips

End Mass Billing

Sometimes, if you want to stop a mass billing, or prebilling in PCLaw, all you need to do is hit the escape key.

Sanction II Settings

I have posted a new white paper for Sanction II Settings. 

Worldox I have not forgotten you!!!

Worldox has just announced a whole bunch of new features.  Check out their website for release dates.  I hope they have something for the Palm and Windows Mobile.

1. wdBlackBerry
   Delivers enterprise documents managed with WORLDOX to attorneys and other mobile professionals using BlackBerry handheld devices.
2. wdSQL
   Essential for WORLDOX sites using SQL-based products. Allows you to copy your WORLDOX Profile Database to the Microsoft SQL Server Database. Also, provides access to WORLDOX Profile data from other SQL-based and ODBC-compliant applications.
3. wdSharePoint
   Microsoft SharePoint portal users can Check Out documents from WORLDOX to SharePoint. When finished working on the documents in SharePoint, they can check the documents back in to WORLDOX.
4. wdElite
   When new Client/Matters and Assignments are created in Elite’s accounting software they are automatically copied over to WORLDOX. Transparent to users, this Connector creates a Quick Profile template and then adds a corresponding folder in their Outlook folder tree. This Connector is also referred to as “My Matters”.
5. wdEas
   Integrates WORLDOX with Zantaz’s “EAS to Exchange” e-mail archiving product. Copy or move e-mails and attachments from the EAS Server to the WORLDOX document store.

Sanction Taskbar

You can remove the Taskbar from the Presentation Mode in Sanction, so all your audience is seeing is the presentation.  Sometimes when you do this you will still see a space of wall paper.  To fix this you need to go to Program Files --> SanctionII --> Utilities,  and click on VSSII8SettingsReader.exe.  Change Root to: Presentation, and Key to: Taskbar.  In the blank space type in -1, and hit set.  That will get rid of the space.

Sanction II and Legal Training

One of my clients is gearing up for a big trial and decided to purchase Sanction II by Verdict Systems.  This client decided to bring in a consultant from Verdict to teach the office how to use Sanction.  I thought this was a brilliant move.  Sanction is an easy program to use, but the day of training got the staff on the same page and probably put us a couple of months ahead if we tried to learn it ourselves.

This client graciously invited me to come to the training and I thought is was very interesting.  I have no plan to add Trial Consulting to Law Office Technology's list of services in the immediate future but it always helps to learn about Legal Software. One of the things I was disappointed to discover was that Worldox and Sanction have trouble working together because of some .dll issue.  I hope Worldox fixes this soon because the two programs could be pretty powerful together. Sanction has a pretty impressive list of clients which include the UN, over 90% of the Top 100 Law Firms in the US, and the Department of Justice.  I am going to blog about to remove the tool bar in presentation view which is ridiculous, but I cannot help myself.

Screen Shots of PCLAW 8

The first thing you will notice about PCLaw 8.0 is that the buttons have been replaced by Graphics.  These are the same graphics that are used in TimeMatters, another LexisNexis Product.   Other Formats like Check General is completely the same.  The coolest thing that I noticed is that fact that PCLaw makes it so easy to track time in Microsoft's Word, Excel, and PowerPoint.  It has created this new tool bar that actually has a timer in it.  Therefore you can be drafting a document and just start a timer without going into PCLaw.

I hope that PCLaw 8.0 helps shed some light to the public on Lexis Nexis's strategy.  They want to make future versions of TimeMatters, Billing Matters and PCLaw more alike and eventually combined them into one integrated product. This my sole opinion, I have no inside info from anyone at Lexis.  An integrated product will be more stable then a linked one, and this a good thing for end users and consultants who want to stop crossing their fingers and go to bed at a reasonable time. 

Time Formating in PCLaw

Time Formating in PCLaw is pretty simple.  You can only record Time Entries in Tenth of an Hour.  There is no minium time but there is a Round Entries to option.   This feature only works when using the timer.  So if I talk to client on the phone for 4 minutes and decide to bill him, it will go in as 6 minutes or 0.10.  Again, this rounding only happens when using a timer.  If I typed in 0.7, it would stay 0.7. 

System Settings --> Data Entry

Time Formating in Amicus Attorney

I am going to go over the Time Entry Settings in Amicus Attorney.  This will apply to version V and 7. 

In V and VII you have the option of tracking time in Tenths of an hour or Minutes.  I am going to talk about Tenths of an hour.  The Minimum Time Entry is the smallest amount you can bill a client.  In my example I have 0.2.  That means that my minimum time is 12 minutes.  If I talk to a client for 4 minutes on the phone and decide to bill him, it will go in as 0.20 or 12 minutes.  This chart might help you.

.10 6 Minutes

.20 12 Minutes

.30 18 Minutes

.40 24 Minutes

.50 30 Minutes

.60 36 Minutes

.70 42 Minutes

.80 48 Minutes

.90 54 Minutes

1.0   60 Minutes

Rounding is not used that much but here are the three settings I often see.

0.10

Any time entry will be rounded up by 0.10.  If my time entry is 0.21 it will be entered as 0.30.

0.21 to 0.29 = 0.30

0.05

Any time entry will be rounded up by 0.05.  If my time entry is 0.21 it will be entered as 0.25.

0.21 to 0.25 = 0.25
0.26 to 0.29 = 0.30

0.01

No time entries will be rounded.  If my time entry is 0.21 it will be entered as 0.21.