User management

Within Legalsense, if you have specific access rights, it is possible to manage users yourself. 

Managing users

Managing users includes adding users, editing users, and marking users as no longer employed. You can manage users under the tab 'Users'. 

Above you can see the users who are active, inactive, or archived within this environment.

Adding a user

To add a new user click on 'New user'. The screen to enter the data of the new user will then open:

Fields marked with * are mandatory. The fields 'Title', 'Initials', 'First name', 'Last name prefix', 'Last name', and 'Abbreviation' speak for themselves.

The other options are explained below:

Is fee earner: When you activate a new user as a fee-earner, Legalsense will also designate them as a fee earner, and an subscription for this fee earner will be charged to you starting from the provided start date.

Dashboard note: In the 'Dashboard note' box, you can type a note that will be displayed on the user's personal dashboard. 

Begin date: The new user's begin date can be set. Thus, you can already create a user whose employment will start later.

End date: The user's end date can be entered here. Until the set date, the user can still log in to Legalsense; after that, the user no longer has access to Legalsense. However, the user's unbilled time remains available for billing.

Employee number: The employee number is also included in the user export and can be used, for example, to create a matter number or distribute turnover to Twinfield.

Expected hours factor: The entered value determines whether a factor should be applied to this user's expected billable hours. This can be useful in cases of illness or leave.

Billing Assistent: Here, one user can be assigned as an assistant for the billing process. This field applies to the billing workflow and can be set as a step within it.

Username: The username is a mandatory field and must be unique. This is the name the user enters as a user name when logging in to Legalsense.

E-mail: The mail address is used to send a welcome e-mail or to send a password reset link. It is therefore a required field.

Permissions: The groups are important because they determine which rights a user has within Legalsense. A user must at least be linked to one group and this is the Timekeeper group.

More information regarding the permissions groups, can be found within our knowdledge base article Default permission groups in Legalsense

Practice group: If practice groups/sections are used in your organization, you can specify the relevant practice group here.

Function: The function is mandatory. The functions are defined under 'Settings' - 'Lists' - 'Functions'. 

Send welcome mail: If this is ticked, an e-mail will automatically be sent to the user with a request to create a password. The mail address must already exist. If it does not already exist and Legalsense sends a welcome e-mail, it will be rejected and the e-mail address will be set to inactive. You will then no longer be able to send or create a welcome e-mail or a new password. Sending a welcome email instructs a user to set up his/her Legalsense account

If you click on 'Save' the employee will be created or the changes will be saved.

A short explanation about adding a user can be found in this video: Adding a user

Editing a user

Editing user data

To edit a user's details, go to 'Users' and click on 'Edit' icon next to the user name:

You will then return to the same screen as when creating a new user where it is possible to modify the desired data. 

In addition to the ability to adjust the previously discussed fields, there is also the option to adjust some preferences at the user level:

Language: This value is set to the Legalsense environment's default setting but can be adjusted per user as needed.

Default reporting currency: Here, you can specify the currency in which reports should be displayed for this user.

Adjusting rates and functions

The adjustment of personal rates and function is done on the user profile itself. In the user list (via Users), click on the user for whom you want to adjust the rates or role:

Rates: To adjust the rates, click on the 'Edit' icon:

You can adjust, add or remove existing rates here.

Function: Here you can modify the user's function by clicking on 'Edit':

The screen above allows you to assign a new function to a user or modify an existing function.

Insolvency

If your firm also handles insolvency matters, you can have this functionality activated by Legalsense support. Once this functionality is enabled in your environment, you will see a section called 'Insolvency' under the user. Under insolvency, everything relevant for calculating the Recofa hourly rate is recorded. The Recofa rate is an annually established rate that is adjusted by Legalsense each year, ensuring that the correct hourly rate is automatically applied to the time entries on the matter.

You can edit this information, by clicking the 'Edit' icon:

Targets and Presence rosters

Legalsense also offers the possibility to add a presence roster and/or a target to a user. The functionality of the presence roster and/or targets is not active by default and can be activated free of charge by Legalsense support. When this functionalities are activated, you will see an extra tab under the user:

The targets become visible in the user's personal dashboard and in his or her performance overview. The presence roster is visible in the user's calendar. The user can then easily see whether the hourly norm has been met.

Targets

Adding a target

To set a target, first open the corresponding user and then click on 'targets' and 'New target'.

The screen to add or edit a target will now open:

In this screen you can set the total workable time based the FTE percentage of the user (if necessary) taking into account holidays, illness, etc.

In addition to the total time, you can also indicate how many hours a person should be billable. Based on the value in this field and the hourly rate available to the user, the field 'Amount' is already filled in by Legalsense. This amount represents his or her turnover target. Of course you can adjust this amount to a value that you have determined yourself.

Amount 2 is an internal target and is not visible to the user by default, but can be made visible in the Performance report for the organization.

You can enter targets for multiple periods. This can be done by adjusting the From and To date.

Click on save and the target is saved for this person.

Adding a Presence roster

In Legalsense it is possible to add a presence roster for an employee. Go to the user you want to add a presence roster and click on the tab 'Presence roster'.

Via the button 'Add roster' you can add a presence roster via the following form:

In this roster can be indicated for the even and odd weeks on which days and how many hours the employee works. Based on this, it is possible that an employee will receive an email if he or she has not yet fully registered his or her hours.

Inactivate user

Click 'Edit' next to the user in the 'Users' screen and enter an end date for this user. From this date the user will no longer be able to log in and will be marked as inactive.Users, in addition to being made inactive, can also be archived. You can see on the respective user's profile via a badge whether the user is inactive or archived and is selectable or not.:

Reactivate user

It is possible that a previously archived user returns to service. In this case, you do not need to create a new user, but you can restore the existing user from the archive.

To do this, go to 'Users' and filter by 'Status' using the 'Archived' filter. You will then see all archived users:

To remove a user from the archive, click on the 'Unarchive' icon:

This will activate the user, allowing you to send a welcome email so that the user can reset their login credentials.

Passwords

When you create a new user, you have the option to send the welcome email at the bottom of the form:

When you click 'Save', the user will be created and a welcome email will be sent to the user. Through this email, the user can set a password within 48 hours using the provided link.

If a user forgets their password, they can click on 'Forgot password' on the login page. They will be asked to provide an email address so that a password reset email can be sent.

Another option is to open the user in Legalsense and, through the 'Options' button, send a non-welcome email:

Actions for multiple users at once

From the user list, you have the option to perform several actions for multiple users at once. You can execute these actions using the 'Send welcome email' and 'More actions...' buttons.

The welcome email can also be sent in bulk from the main "Users" menu. This can be useful, for example, during a new Legalsense installation, when pre-creating a new user, or when adding multiple new users at once. This way, you can send the email to multiple or all users at once.

To do this, select the desired users or all users using the checkboxes next to their names. Then, click the 'Send welcome email' button at the top. Confirming this action will send the welcome email to the selected users.

Legalsense will now send the welcome email to all active email addresses from the selection.

N.B. sending 'Welcome emails' is not advised when using single sign-on (SSO) to force or allow users to access Legalsense. See above under "Welcome email and SSO".

Under the 'More actions...' button, you have the following options, which will be explained below the image:

Make selectable: This option allows you to mark multiple selected users, who are currently marked as 'unselectable', as 'selectable' again.
Make unselectable: This option allows you to mark multiple selected users, who are currently marked as 'selectable', as 'non-selectable'.
New function: This option allows you to assign a new role to multiple selected users.
New target: This option allows you to assign a new target to multiple selected users.