Client Management

If you have the appropriate access rights, you can manage clients yourself: add clients, edit clients, and archive or delete clients you no longer work for.

Managing clients

Go to Matters → Clients to see all active and archived clients in your environment.

Clients page, showing the list of active clients.

Use client search to find a specific client quickly, or use the filters under More filters, such as referrer, sector, or billing status. See the article ↪ Client search for a full overview of the available filters.

Adding a client

Go to Matters → Clients and choose New client or From existing contact.

Clients menu, showing the New client and From existing contact options.

Use From existing contact only if the contact already exists in Legalsense under Contacts but isn't yet a client. This copies the existing contact's details to the new client. After selecting the contact, click New client to continue with the client creation process.

Contact selection screen for creating a client from an existing contact.

You can also create a client directly from an existing contact's page.

New client option shown on a contact's page.

Creating a client is a three-step process:

1. Contact information. Enter the contact details and debtor information. Select Organization to add a company as a client, or Natural person to add an individual. The two options have different fields to complete.

New client form, step 1, showing the contact information fields.

Fields marked with an asterisk (*) are mandatory. Fill in as much contact information as possible: this helps during a conflict check and when consulting debtor information later. Contact Legalsense support if you want additional fields marked as mandatory. Click Next to continue. 2. Client information. The contact you entered in step 1 is now turned into a client.

New client form, step 2, showing the client information fields.

Depending on your Legalsense environment's configuration, you can fill in: - Alternative names: trade names and similar. The conflict check also searches alternative names. - Number: usually left empty, since Legalsense assigns it automatically. - Date: the date the first work was done for the client. - Description: a description of the client. - Parent client: if the client is a subsidiary, specify the parent company here. The parent client must already exist in Legalsense. You can report on the parent client. - Referrer: the external party that referred the client. You can report on referrers; manage the list under Settings → Lists → Referrers. - Originator: the fee earner who brought in the client (the internal referrer). This field is also available in Legalsense reports. - Sector: the sector classification for the client, if your organization uses one. You can search clients by sector; see the article ↪ Client search. - Branches: the branch or branches associated with the client, if your organization classifies clients this way. You can search clients by branch; see the article ↪ Client search.

Click Next to continue. 3. Pricing information. Record the pricing information for the client.

New client form, step 3, showing the pricing information fields.

• Is billable: by default, a client is created as billable, meaning time written on matters under this client can be included on invoices. Unchecking this field makes the client non-billable by default, along with all matters created under it, so only non-billable activities are visible when writing time. We recommend leaving the default setting as is, and applying non-billable status at matter level instead.
  • Currency: the currency in which activities are displayed on the client's invoices. Only shown if multi-currency is enabled for your Legalsense environment.
  • Office expense rate: the default office expense rate; you can set a different one at client level.
  • Discount rate: the default discount rate for the client. This applies to all active matters under the client, unless you set a different rate at matter level.
  • Pricing scheme: determines which rates apply to the client. Every matter created for this client has the same pricing scheme by default, though you can set a different one at matter level. For more information, see the article ↪ Pricing schemes.

To finish, click Save and new matter to save the client and immediately start adding a new matter for it, or click Save to save the client without adding a new matter.

Editing a client

To edit a client, first select it: go to Matters → Clients and click the client you want to open. For more information about finding a specific client, see the article ↪ Client search.

The client overview shows all information about the selected client.

• Click Edit in the Client details section to open the same page as step 2 of the client creation process and edit the client information.

Client overview page, part 1, showing the client's details.

• Click Edit in the Contact information section to open the same page as step 1 of the client creation process and edit the contact information.

Client overview page, part 2, showing the contact's details.

• Click Edit in the Pricing information section to open the same page as step 3 of the client creation process and edit the pricing information.

Client overview page, part 3, showing the client's pricing information.

Note: If the engagement letter feature is activated for your Legalsense environment, use the Edit button to attach an engagement letter to the client and track its status. The matter page and the AML matter page also show the engagement letter and its status for the client.

The Financial information section shows the client's billing history.

Active matters

Shows all active matters linked to the client. Click a matter number to open that matter.

Archived matters

Shows all archived matters linked to the client. Click a matter number to open that matter.

New matter

Click New matter to quickly create a new matter for an existing client. The new matter inherits the client's office expenses, language setting, standard billing template, discount percentage, and pricing scheme, though you can deviate from these at matter level.

Archiving and deleting a client

To archive

Click To archive to archive the client. Archiving removes the client from the list of active clients and places it on the list of archived clients. You can only archive a client once all its time entries, disbursements, and invoices have been fully settled.

Important: Archiving a client also archives all active matters associated with it.

Delete

This button appears on the client overview when you open an already archived client for editing. Click Delete to delete the client. Deletion is only possible if the client doesn’t have any invoices, whether paid or unpaid. It also can’t be a parent client to other clients.

Note: You can also archive or delete a client directly from the client list.

Client list, showing the archive and delete icons next to a client.

For more on how archiving works across matters, clients, and contacts, see the article ↪ Archiving.