Recording your time spent on cases
The Bar of Northern Ireland Practice Management time recording function is designed to allow users to record time and to allocate it against the cases they are working on.
To start using Time Recording, click on the drop down from the Time Recording menu at the top of the page.
Activities
In the time recording drop down menu there is an option for Activities.
Activities are used to speed up the process of recording timing tasks that are used on a regular basis.
For example, Consultation, Drafting, Writing a Brief, etc.
Clicking on the Activities option opens a screen that allows you to add and manage the activity templates.
These will be available when creating a time record in the Activity drop down menu.
To add an Activity template click on the New button
Start by entering a narrative for a description of the Activity.
When selecting a Rate Type in the drop down menu, Hourly or Fixed can be chosen. This can be edited when creating a time.
To enter a time record click on Create a Time Record.
By clicking on Create a Time Record, the user can enter details of the time that they want to record.
Select the case required from the drop down menu. (You can also type in the name of the case to find the correct one.)
Add a date of the time to be recorded.
By entering the start and end times, the system will calculate the hours and minutes spent on the time record.
Add a Description as required which will appear on the fee note.
Click on Confirm Entry to save the information against that record.
Click on the Non-billable time check box and that time will then not appear when creating a fee item but will appear on case reports
If there is mileage to be added, click on the Add Mileage button
Adding Mileage
When adding mileage you can populate a From and To Location.
In the Type drop down, you can select between a Return trip and One Way. The distance will be based on this selection.
Enter the distance and choose either Kilometres or Miles as required.
Add in the Rate per Kilometre/Mile which will calculate the amount to appear on the fee.
Billing a Time Record and Mileage
When a new fee is created all the time records saved against this case will appear.
To include a time record simply tick the check box to the right of the entry as seen in the image above.
If mileage is included there will be an extra line on the fee note.
Click on Confirm Entry to save the time record to the case.
Viewing and Managing Time Records
Details of all time entries are available by clicking the View Time Records option in the Time Recording drop down menu.
A specific report on the times recorded is available in the existing reports section.
Time Recording Reports
The report is structured in a way that it lists the time entries by case.
The report can be exported to either Excel or PDF
