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Bill4Time Review: Timekeeping & Billing Software for Law Firms

May 10, 2014 By Bill4Time Staff Leave a Comment

Published by Jurispage | May 2014 by Andrew Cabasso

First up in our attorney-tested law firm timekeeping and billing software comparison series is Bill4Time. Bill4Time helps attorneys keep time on their matters and bill clients. Bill4Time is cloud-based, allowing you to easily take a free trial, try out their software, create your matters, log time, and bill your clients – from any computer, tablet, or phone.

About Cloud Based Timekeeping Software

As I’ve mentioned before, I generally prefer cloud-based software for timekeeping and billing (software you access via the Internet rather than software installed on a server in your office). It’s secure, easy to use, easy to scale if I ever have more users, and the support is fantastic. Some attorneys have irrational fears of cloud-based software, worried about the security or potential ethical issues. While I am not your attorney and am not offering you legal advice, law firms are generally in compliance with the ABA model rules when they take “reasonable” precautions to protect their information (a good password helps). Realistically, it’s more likely that the server you installed in your office with out-of-date software and security updates is more vulnerable to attack than cloud-based software.

There’s also a very small learning curve with this and other cloud-based timekeeping / billing software. It was fairly easy for me to get started. I didn’t need a “consultant” to train me how to use Bill4Time. Though, when I had a question about a particular feature, their support team was incredibly responsive.

Features

Bill4Time was created with attorneys in mind, offering features that many attorneys would find helpful, and possibly essential. Bill4Time is definitely the most feature-rich software for timekeeping and billing clients.

Bill4Time operates a lot like more full-featured case management software. Each individual matter has a dashboard screen where you can see not only related time entries, but schedules, documents, accounting and trust accounting, attorneys assigned to the matter, and their associated billing rates for the matter. While you may not need all of these features, they are at your disposal.

Regarding timekeeping, you can batch your time entries (this is something not many of the others seem to have). From one screen you can create multiple time entries. This is particularly useful if you are the type of user who creates entries all at once at the end of the day rather than keeping time as you go. In the competitors’ applications, you have to create each time entry one by one.

Bill4Time can integrate with the QuickBooks desktop and online versions. How this works is that you can export Bill4Time entries as a file type that QuickBooks can read, and then import it into your QuickBooks software. One issue though is that Bill4Time cannot transpose trust account information. Your trust account tab in Bill4Time stays where it is. If you want to keep tabs of your trust accounts, you need to do it manually in QuickBooks. Also, Bil4Time works one-way with QuickBooks – you can export Bill4Time info to QuickBooks, but not send QuickBooks information to Bill4Time. The two-way sync is something Ebillity has that Bill4Time doesn’t.

One interesting feature of Bill4Time is the scheduling ability. Attorney users can schedule calls with clients and have the related information become a time entry.

Bill4Time can be used offline. Bill4Time has an offline-enabled desktop widget. From your computer desktop, you can track your time (even when offline), start and stop your timer, and even add expenses.

Bill4Time is very attorney-friendly. Some other attorney-related Bill4Time features include:

·ABA Activity, Expense, and Task Codes
·LEDES and Litigation Advisor Exports
·Trust Accounting with Summaries and Reports
·Easily Check for Conflicts of Interest

Bill4Time touts its document storage ability that effectively turns Bill4Time into a Dropbox-like service, allowing users to store documents in the cloud and sync documents to particular matters. This may not be necessary for your needs.

Batch billing and invoicing with Bill4Time lets you create multiple time entries for different clients all on one screen, saving you time from clicking “New time entry” several times over.

For invoicing, you can customize the layout, add your own logo, batch invoice multiple clients at once, create PDF bills to send via snail mail, or send bills via email to your client so they can pay online if you choose.

Down the road, Bill4Time is working on creating a “pay with credit card” without having the user go through PayPal.

User Permissions

Bill4Time has more features than competitors when it comes to user permissions and reports. Admin users can see all users’ login history with extensive, custom reporting features so you can see how productive particular users are (e.g. is a user billing as he/she goes or just logging in once a week to come up with hours?). These reporting features are by far the most comprehensive of any of the timekeeping applications out there. It goes beyond the standard reporting features of the other software providers.

Bill4Time also lets you set whether users can see their billing rate or any invoices. You can set billing rates per attorney or override to create new billing rates on specific matters.

Drawbacks

One potential drawback with Bill4Time is that if you are looking to receive invoice payments using this platform, you’re limited to using PayPal only (as of May 5, 2014 – it should be noted that Bill4Time’s staff is working on accepting credit cards without PayPal, but that’s not a released feature yet). I dislike this for two reasons – the first is that I’ve had PayPal freeze funds received, preventing them from getting into my account. I’ve also heard of similar stories others have had. PayPal claims it’s trying to crack down on fraud, but I’ve heard of no issues like this with any other payment gateway. The second issue with PayPal: when the user is billed and pays their bill, the payment screen has PayPal’s branding on it. Personally, I don’t like having PayPal branding on user payments because I think it’s unprofessional – I think there is an amateurish mental association with PayPal from the client perspective, as PayPal is primarily used for collecting donations, paying for eBay items, or paying for crafts from small online stores; PayPal doesn’t really have a “professional” association. However, to be fair, this may just be me and many clients may not see an issue with paying for legal services via PayPal. In fact, they may be impressed that they can pay for legal services online to begin with and not make much of the fact that it’s via PayPal.

Note: Following this publication, Bill4TIme launched a client payment portal with the option to pay online via credit card or PayPal. This integration offers clients to brand the portal and create a gateway for customers to pay for services easily online.

Another drawback, as mentioned above is that QuickBooks is one-way integration, requiring that you export your data to QuickBooks when needed, but if you’re doing accounting at the end of each month it may not be so burdensome.

Pricing & Support

Bill4Time has a straightforward per user cost:

$39.99 per month for your first user;

$9.99 per month for any additional user.

Regarding support, Bill4Time does a decent job. There are many user help videos and a large knowledge base. There’s also a live chat program so you can ask questions of a support staffer while in your client dashboard. Bill4Time does have a support line that had a bit of a wait when I did call, but they answered all of my questions fairly quickly. If you’re interested in trying it out, you can get a 30-day free trial with no credit card required.

About the Author: Andrew Cabasso
Andrew Cabasso is a practicing attorney and co-founder of JurisPage, an Internet Marketing firm specializing in online presence solutions for law firms including website design, SEO, and search marketing. He has given many lectures and CLEs on website design and Internet marketing to legal professionals. He is the author of Search Engine Optimization for Lawyers and The Complete Guide to Attorney PPC. Follow Andrew on Google+ or Twitter.

Bill4Time Review: Time Tracker Reviews

April 15, 2014 By Bill4Time Staff Leave a Comment

Summary
Bill4Time is a time tracking and invoicing software product that works well for a variety of professional services, such as lawyers, and accountants. It has quality mobile friendly apps that make tracking time on the fly easy, and it has easy to use features for scheduling tasks and gives users the ability to upload documents.

Features
Time Tracking
Bill4Time is built around tracking time for various clients and projects for business professionals. It can be configured for your particular business (for example CPAs or lawyers). The time tracking fits this theme and makes it easy to allocate hours worked to a specific client or project.

One feature they could add to time tracking would be the ability to upload hours worked from an excel sheet. This only is an issue when first migrating to the system, since anything after that will be added as worked, but for professional businesses trying to keep their records ordered this could be important.

Invoicing and Billing
This software is perfect for accountants and lawyers who need to bill clients based on hours worked, contingencies or on a flat rate. The system is compliant with Legal Electronic Data Exchange (LEDES), which makes it the choice for many legal professionals. Gives users the ability to customize invoices with text and upload logos. Bill4Time has integrations for Quickbooks, PayPal and credit card processors.

Not intuitive for billing prepaid hours.

Projects
Bill4Time allows you to create multiple projects under a client, and then tasks under each project. Each task can be assigned to a specific user to be completed by. Again for lawyers Bill4Time distinguishes itself by incorporating American Bar Association (ABA) Task Codes directly into its task menu, making it simple and intuitive to bill clients for services rendered.

Pricing
Bill4Time has pricing plans for regular users and legal users. For regular users they are:

Solo – one user $9.99/month
Pro – one user $19.99/month includes all features, can add additional users at $5.99/user
Enterprise – one user $59.99/month includes all features plus unlimited storage and premium support, can add additional users at $5.99/user

For legal users there are several added features that are available for every user level including, ABA activity expense, and task codes, LEDES and litigation advisor exports, trust accounting with summaries and reports and the ability to easily check for conflicts of interest. The pricing plans are:

Solo – one user $19.99/month
Pro – one user $39.99/month includes all features, can add additional users at $9.99/user
Enterprise – one user $99.99/month includes all features plus unlimited storage and premium support, can add additional users at $9.99/user

Conclusion
If I were a lawyer or accountant this would be the time tracking and invoicing system I used, bar-none. However since I’m not the features were a bit of overkill for what I need, and the pricing was prohibitive.

New Feature: Invoice Add-Ons

June 4, 2010 By Bill4Time Staff Leave a Comment

If take a look at your Bill4Time invoice templates, you’ll notice some new features at the bottom of the window. These add-ons consolidate the extra information that is usually attached to the invoice.

How Much Does Legal Billing Software Cost?

April 24, 2025 By Dan Bowman Leave a Comment

Attorney time and billing software can cost around $30 per month per user to hundreds of dollars per month per user, depending on the provider. There are a variety of legal e-billing vendors to choose from, each with their own sets of features, all of which are around a similar price point. But if you really want to know how much a billing software will cost you per month, you’ll need to consider more than price; it’s also about worth.

The true value of billing software is in saved time, smooth workflows, and an overall easier collection process. With that in mind, the best software will feel less like an expense, and more like an essential piece of your practice — one that runs things behind the scene so you can focus more attention on your clients and billable tasks.

What Factors Affect the Cost of Legal Billing Software?

The main factors that affect billing software’s price are the features they offer, the size of your firm, any unique needs of your practice, and the provider’s payment plans. You will commonly see multiple ‘tiers’ of pricing with scaling offerings of features, support, and integrations. Depending on the provider, there may also be added fees to look out for, particularly if their software does not have its own payment processor.

Regardless of the numbers, providers typically price on a per-user, per-month basis. Sometimes, they will offer a slight discount for paying annually versus monthly; for example, Bill4Time’s basic plan comes at a lower rate when paid annually and includes more within its base pricing than many others at a similar level.

Another factor for pricing is whether the software is cloud-based or uses on-premise technology. Typically, cloud-based software is almost always the best option; it’s cheaper due to using less hardware and requires far less maintenance from you, the end user. Additionally, cloud-based billing software is far more flexible, particularly those that come with mobile app support.

Cloud technology also saves money by letting you incorporate smart devices your business already has, cutting down upfront investment even further. On top of that, cloud technology has consistent pricing and can easily scale up as your business grows and gains new, loyal clients.

Is Free Legal Billing Software an Option for Law Firms?

That depends on how you define ‘option.’ Free tools may seem like a smart move, but in reality, they will end up costing you more than they ‘save.’ So, when it comes to legal billing software, free is less of a green light and more of a red flag.

The word free is pretty tempting, especially for a small law firm owner. But free software rarely offers any security, support, or meaningful features. Even if the software does happen to have good features, they will most likely be sitting behind a paywall. On top of that, you’ll likely be stuck figuring it out solo, with no guidance on ways to actually improve your billing process.

Rather than asking, “What’s the cheapest billing tool I can get by with?” ask: “What software is actually going to help my practice thrive?” The right billing solution won’t feel like an expense; it’ll be momentum to your firm’s success. If it doesn’t feel like that, then it’s not the right choice.

With that in mind…

**What’s the Right Legal Billing Software Budget for Your Firm?**

The right budget strikes a balance between price and value: a price you can afford, with a value that you want. So to find the right fit, start by asking: what is most valuable to your firm?

Are you looking to save time?
Do you want support for compliance?
Want to simplify the invoicing process?
Need to speed up collections?
Seeking a better billing workflow overall?

Any or all of these can be answered with legal billing software. But finding the right software for your firm’s practice matters more than picking something with trendy features. A solid way to evaluate cost is to consider how many billable hours you could recover by using the software. If it saves even a few hours a month on invoicing, follow-ups, or reconciling payments, the time regained may outweigh the monthly fee.

Before committing to any software, make sure to do a free trial — regardless of who the provider is. Just because a platform has high marks and five-star reviews doesn’t mean it will work well with your firm. Plus, since most software is cloud-based, free trials don’t require tons of setup.

How Much Should Billing Software Cost for a Small Law Firm?

Billing software pricing can vary widely depending on the provider, the size of your firm, and the features included. Most platforms offer tiered plans to accommodate different needs. For instance, Bill4Time’s entry-level plan starts at $27 per user, per month when billed annually.

But price is just one of many factors that determine the true “cost” of billing software. The “cheapest” option might cost less money, but it also might end up costing you missed hours, clerical errors, and unpaid invoices.

If the software doesn’t actively save you time, stress, and energy, then it’s not worth the price. Look for software that’s both affordable and helpful. Good providers offer software that’s user-friendly, flexible, and efficient — and that’s what we provide at Bill4Time.

Bill4Time strikes a keen balance between cost and value. For less than $30 per month, you’ll have a simple, efficient, streamlined way of handling your billing. From initial time tracking to collecting the final payment, everything goes into one single source — including a native law firm payment processor, which means more secure collections for you and your clients. Firms of all sizes use Bill4Time for case management, time tracking, trust accounting, and much more.

You’ve probably seen plenty of threads discussing the best legal billing software on Reddit and other forums — and it’s smart to look at what other attorneys are saying. Once you’ve done your research, the next move is to see how platforms like Bill4Time perform in real life. Start a free Bill4Time trial today, or click below to schedule a demo tailored to your firm. Let us show you how billing software can boost your firm’s operations and be an excellent return on investment.

Get a Custom Bill4Time Demo

Law Firm Invoice Templates (with Examples)

January 2, 2025 By Dan Bowman Leave a Comment

When you became a lawyer, you probably didn’t realize how much time you’d spend on billing and other administrative work. While billing can be time-consuming, it’s your processes that determine how much of your non-billable time is allocated toward it.

Depending on the type of law you practice and the cases you take on, invoices are one piece of the billing pie that can eat up precious time.

With varying line items, discounts, or billing terms — having invoice templates for your most common cases can greatly reduce the time spent creating different versions of an invoice for clients.

A proper invoice process can save you time and even get you paid faster. Continue reading to learn the importance of a professional law firm invoice template, examples, and how to automate the process.

The Importance of a Professional Law Firm Invoice

As with any other correspondence from your law firm, your invoice speaks to how you conduct business and your professionalism.

If your law firm’s invoice often brings about questions or confusion for clients, it may appear as if your law firm doesn’t value transparency and can even delay payment.

Messy invoices can confuse clients and create issues with accounting and reporting. Without the right billing and invoicing process, your firm can face possible legal action against your firm due to incorrect billing. There are also important ethical considerations that you should keep in mind when evaluating your law firm’s billing process.

Not only is a clear, organized invoice essential to upholding client trust and maintaining the professional reputation of your firm — it can greatly impact your cash flow and billing cycle.

person using tablet with bill4time invoice templates

What Should Be Included in a Law Firm Invoice?

While each invoice can vary based on your law firm’s area of practice and casework, here are a few basic details that should always be included in a law firm invoice:

Law firm contact information: Firm name, mailing, physical address, email address, and phone number. You can also include your firm’s logo.
Client information: It’s best practice to discuss with the client how the invoice should be addressed. For example, if it’s a business, they may have a specific billing contact.
The date: This should be the date you send the invoice.
A complete list of services: Provided a completed itemized list of your services. They should be detailed in the same manner you discussed with the client during onboarding to limit confusion. This could include uniform task-based billing codes for litigation, introduced by the American Bar Association (ABA).
The billable rate for each service: The amount you charge for each itemized service provided.
Total of services: The sum of all charges for the services provided.
Any related tax: Percentage of applicable taxes.
Discounts: If applicable, include any concessions discussed with the client.
Billing policy: Outline the payment terms — this should include the due date and late payment policies.
Forms of payment: List all acceptable forms of payment methods.

Use Legal Billing Software to Streamline Your Law Firm Invoice Process

Traditional invoicing practices rely on manual processes that can leave law firms open to human error, hinder productivity, and even cost you money. Legal billing software is a simple way for law firms to standardize their billing and invoice process without a heavy lift.

Finding a solution that does it all is even better, Bill4Time automates all processes of a law firm’s billing cycle. Time tracking, custom invoice templates, built-in payment processing, and custom payment links with Link2Pay, are just a few features that cut time spent on administrative tasks while reducing the billing cycle and getting firms paid faster.

A common scenario: You’re jumping between client cases and forget how much time you spent on a specific client. Bill4Time has multiple timers that can capture your activity simultaneously as you work freely.

This provides a seamless way to increase the accuracy of your billable time and the services you provide clients. Then, when it’s time to create an invoice, you can pull from your saved invoice templates within Bill4Time and create an itemized bill from your activity.

Examples of Law Firm Invoice Templates

Classic Activity Invoice Example

classic activity law firm invoice templates

Classic Invoice Example

Official Invoice Example

Professional Invoice Example

Standard Invoice Template Example

Get Paid Faster with Automated Law Firm Invoice Templates

Manual billing and invoicing practices are a thing of the past. Rid your law firm of an inefficient billing process that fosters human error, increases the risk of revenue leakage, and decreases client satisfaction.

Combined with these tips and standardized billing and invoice processes with the use of legal billing software, your law firm will be on its way to a stress-free billing process that gets you paid faster.

To see all of the features listed in action, you can schedule a demo with Bill4Time to see how it can save your firm time and money through automated processes.

Lawyer Time Tracking Tips to Boost Efficiency

December 17, 2024 By Nina Lee Leave a Comment

Time is of the essence for law firms. Not only is accurate lawyer time tracking vital for record-keeping and tracking billable hours, but wasting time on manual tasks and following archaic processes distracts from what’s important: practicing law and growing your firm.

Many lawyers choose to track time the old-fashioned way: manually recording their time in logs and calendars. But this introduces the possibility of inaccurate timekeeping, missed billable hours, and — especially if your firm is large or growing — inconsistent record-keeping habits amongst your staff. As a result, you lose time, money, and even clients.

To assist with this problem, this blog explores how outdated time tracking methods hold firms back and offers practical tips to modernize the process. From understanding the importance of six-minute increments to leveraging legal time tracking software, you’ll learn how to boost accuracy, reduce missed income, and avoid common mistakes.

What Are the ABA Guidelines on Time Tracking?

Legal time tracking is when a lawyer records how much time they’ve spent working for a client — whether it’s in the office, in a courtroom, or on the go. The American Bar Association (ABA) sets guidelines for legal time tracking. First-timers, especially, should:

Regularly check their bills. That way, you can avoid getting accused of padding hours (i.e., rounding up and overcharging clients).
Charge reasonable fees in accordance with Model Rule 1.5 or your state’s equivalent. This number can help monitor your hours and share if you over or undercharged someone.
Use time tracking tools to help ensure accuracy and organization. You can log your hours via your phone, computer, or tablet.

What Are Lawyers Using to Track Their Time?

Legal time tracking has evolved in the past several years and moved away from handwritten notes on notebooks or sticky notes. Some continue to use Excel spreadsheets, but even these are prone to error due to manual entry and a host of other issues. Overall, the busier you get, the more difficult it is to stay organized and stay on top of logging.

Nowadays, many attorneys are switching to automated time tracking software solutions. This technology allows you to log your hours right away and track how long you’ve spent in meetings, making phone calls, writing and sending emails, and going from website to website, among other tasks.

By the end of the day, you can easily figure out what you did and how long you spent on each client. It’ll give your administration team less of a headache when you submit your hours and send clients’ invoices.

How Does Legal Time Tracking Software Work?

Legal time tracking software is a simple and efficient way to accurately log your time working for your clients. Bad timekeeping is the culprit for up to 50% of lost billable time, and legal time tracking software is the best way to combat this. All you need to do is start a timer on your computer, phone, or tablet and enter how much time you spent on a task.

You may think, “Well, yeah, but why do I need software to do that when I can do it on my own?”

You’d be interested to know that that’s just one benefit of having legal time tracking software, as it also offers:

Flexible time tracking: This feature covers recording billable and non-billable time, separating tasks unrelated to internal non-client time and keeping track of staff, consultants, and other colleagues.
Staying on top of your time spent on clients: With legal time billing software, you can check your weekly time summaries, so you can gauge your firm’s financial status and productivity.
Easy time entry: This feature allows you to run multiple timers on one screen and account for appointments as time entries.

These features can make every billable hour count so you can charge your clients and get paid fairly.

How Does Legal Time Tracking Software Work

What Should I Look for in Legal Time Tracking Software?

There are multiple legal time tracking apps to choose from, so it may be overwhelming to find one that best fits your needs. To start, ask yourself which features would be most important to you. While you’re doing your research, see if the time and billing software offers:

Convenience: Hours, tasks, phone calls, meetings, upcoming events, and every document you can think of. Do you have to be in the office at your computer to log this information, or can you do it anywhere?

Accuracy: Accuracy should be one of your firm’s highest values, and the software you choose must reflect that. Does the software help your firm cut back non-billable hours? Does it allow you to go back and make a correction if you didn’t stop your timer or need to update a client profile? If the answer is no, you may want to keep looking for technology that leaves wiggle room for human error.

Accessibility: See if the software produces periodic reports on timekeeping. Knowing what you’re dedicating your time to and for how long helps you make more well-informed decisions about the direction of your firm.

There’s more to a legal software app than just timekeeping, so check out the other features the software offers that keep all aspects in check. That includes case, task, and documentation management, trust accounting, invoice template customization, and system integration.

Bill4Time is the way to go if you want to get to a point where you’ll barely have to think about legal billing. It’ll do the work for you, so you can focus on what’s most important: your clients. Within the first few hours of use, you’ll be convinced that it’s the best time tracking software.

Common Mistakes Lawyers Make with Time Tracking and Tips to Fix Them

Below are some of the most common mistakes lawyers make with time tracking — and how to avoid them:

Waiting Too Long to Log Hours: Delaying time entry until the end of the day — or worse, the end of the week or month — leads to forgotten tasks, miscalculated hours, and lost billable time. Keeping track of hours as you go is the best solution
Overlooking Small, Billable Tasks: Emails, quick client calls, and short research sessions often go unrecorded, leading to significant revenue leakage over time. Track everything, no matter how small.
Failing to Differentiate Billable vs. Non-Billable Hours: Without a clear system, non-billable administrative work can blend in with client hours, skewing your records and firm productivity metrics. Use time tracking software to separate billable and non-billable tasks automatically.
Losing Track of Time Spent Across Devices: Lawyers often switch between phones, laptops, and tablets while working, leading to gaps in tracked time. Choose software with cross-device compatibility so you can log hours seamlessly wherever you work.
Not Reviewing Time Entries for Accuracy: Even with a strong tracking system, errors happen — like timers left running or entries logged under the wrong client. Pick a regular review schedule and stick to it.
Ignoring Client Transparency: Vague or incomplete time entries raise client doubts and can escalate into billing disputes. Clearly document your time with task descriptions and use detailed reports to back up your invoices.

The best way to resolve all of these issues is using time tracking software. Having a legal time tracking app can save you time (and panic) when you have to charge your client. That way, you can easily pull up what tasks you performed and for how long when you bill your client. If there’s ever a dispute, you’ll have the evidence of your work to back up your claim right in your pocket.

The key to lawyer time tracking is making it simple. Tracking your time should be something that flows seamlessly throughout your day, no matter how many cases you’re working on. Bill4Time keeps your time tracking and legal billing in a centralized location to give you better insight into how and where your time and money are being allocated. To see how Bill4Time can do the heavy lifting for your firm, you can schedule a demo today by clicking below to see the platform’s time-saving features in action.

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