Partner Has F'n Had It With You Entering All Your Time On The Last Day!

Fixing billing habits is a two-way street.

billable hour clock garbageIf you enter 25 hours or more of billable time on the last day of the month at Goldberg Segalla, I suggest you get your act together before the Golden Scimitar of Revenue Realization cleaves your shiftless associate body in twain.

A senior partner sent an all hands email calling out timekeepers who routinely shove their time into the system at the last second and mess up the monthly close. And while the email is chuckle-worthy in its over-the-top tone, the fact of the matter is…

He’s absolutely right.

Though there’s probably a better way of sorting this out. Let’s break it down:

I am writing this email to all attorneys, paralegals or anyone responsible to assist them with entering billable time charges.

This is the last email that I will send to “All Enterprise” on the topic of entering billable time.

That seems like wishful thinking.

As you are aware, we continue to have a problem with a select group of timekeepers who insist on entering the majority of their time charges on the last day. Almost without fail, this practice has caused Expert Time to crash, directly impacted the members of our IT, Billing, and Finance Teams and caused the firm to delay its month closing process.

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On the one hand, this is very much a tech problem. The system shouldn’t be crashing just because a handful of users enter a lot of hours at once. Theoretically — if fancifully — everyone in the firm enters hours every day so if the system can’t handle a lot of users logged in at once it speaks to a much deeper problem.

But it’s true that there are folks relying on lawyers to get time entered on schedule so the firm can go out and get the money it needs to keep paying everyone. Realization is always a sticking point for firms, why contribute to making the problem worse?

Over the past few months, I have urged folks to change their practice habits, to enter their time each week, and not to overload the system on the last day. Unfortunately, my requests over the past few months have been ignored by some and we now have to address the situation directly with those who are putting themselves above above the firm and showing little respect for our community.

This misdiagnoses at least some of the problem. There may well be laziness afoot here and there, but attorneys often blow off entering time because they’re simply too busy. It’s a chore that takes them away from the job they’re supposed to be doing all day.

Preaching more personal responsibility is great and all, but the firm really needs to consider more automation. There are a whole range of products out there leveraging new technology to automate these processes so firms don’t have to rely on hundreds of people doing everything by the book. A study found that a plurality of associates think they waste upwards of 35 percent of their days on non-billable administrative stuff. Instead of demanding they do non-billable work in a more timely manner, focus on taking as much of it as possible out of their hands entirely.

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I have been tracking late time entries for past several months particularly focusing on the timekeepers that are entering more than 25 hours of time on the last day (and usually in the last few hours before the deadline). In many cases these folks are entering 50 or even 100 hours of time on the last day. I will be sending this group a separate email so they know who they are. I am not playing favorites here so if you have regularly entered more than 25 hours of billable time on the last day of the month, you will receive an email.

Speaking of attorneys wasting time on non-billable work, consider that this partner tracked timekeepers for months. Do something so he doesn’t have to keep doing this.

I will receive a report on February 2nd listing all of the timekeepers who entered more than 25 hours of time on February 1st. I will publish this list to the Facilitation Committee and Practice Group Leaders. If you are on the list, I will also reach out to you directly to discuss the situation and will involve Practice Group Leaders and the Facilitation Committee as necessary until we can finally resolve this situation.

I can’t speak to this firm, but in my experience some of the worst timekeepers I’ve encountered ARE practice group leaders.

I cannot tell you how much I really hoped it would not come to this. But I cannot tolerate this situation any further when I know how much it is negatively impacting our community.

Did this need to be an all firm callout? No. But entering time is important and everyone involved needs to do a better job, and that includes the firm taking the steps necessary to build a better process that avoids this problem in the first place.

Earlier: Saving Law Firm Billables Begins With Automation


HeadshotJoe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.