Billing items appear as line items in the Billing Entries tab of the project Billing section and can be added to invoices. There are three types of billing entries: time entries, expenses, and flat fee items.
Item Types
All available billing item types are listed below. Each billing item includes fields for the date, a description of the item, options for making the item billable or chargeable, and, if set up, options for billing codes.
Time Entries
Time entries capture the time that a team member spends working on a project. Users can create time entries in various places, including the following:
- the Timesheet flyout
- in the timer
- from an activity item in the project’s Activity Feed
- as part of an auto-task generated from a taskflow
- the project Billing section (shown below)
- from the calendar
To create a time entry in the project Billing section:
-
Click the plus button. In the Time Entries category, click the plus button to open the Add Time Entry modal.
- Choose a team member. Search for the name or @username of the team member you would like to add a time entry for. Select the user from the list. If you’d like Filevine to “remember” the selected timekeeper in future entries, select Remember my selection.
- Enter the date, billing rate (if applicable), hours, description, and billing codes (if applicable). The date will fill in automatically but can be edited. Users with rate-viewing permissions can view and edit the hourly billable rate. Fill in the other fields in the form as required. If your Org has set up billing codes, you can enter or choose a code from the dropdown.
- (Optional) Save the entry as a draft. Time entries have a unique Draft status. Select Save as Draft if your time entry requires further review before it is invoice-ready.
- Confirm billable and chargeable settings. Toggle the billable and chargeable options on or off as applicable.
- Save.
Expenses
Use expense entries to keep track of the costs incurred by your firm while working on a project. These could be hard costs like court filing fees, or soft costs like printing color copies in-house.
To create an expense in the project Billing section:
-
Click the plus button. In the Expense category, click the plus button to open the Add an Expense modal.
- Confirm the date. The date will fill in automatically but can be edited.
- (Optional) Choose a template. You can use the “Expense Name” field to search for a template. Once selected, the template automatically populates the description, price, unit, and billing code fields (if applicable). You can still edit these fields if desired by clicking the pencil icon next to the respective field.
- Enter the quantity, price per unit, unit, description, and billing codes (if applicable). Fill in the other fields in the form as required. For quantity, enter the number of items purchased or used, or enter “1” if the quantity is irrelevant. For price per unit, enter the amount to charge for each item. For unit, enter a label for the individual items purchased or used—like “page” for color copies or “mile” for mileage entries.
- (Optional) Attach relevant files. You can use the “Attachments” section to attach relevant documents, like receipts. Learn more about billing item attachments.
- Confirm billable and chargeable settings. Toggle the billable and chargeable options on or off as applicable.
- Save.
Flat Fees
Use flat fees to track the non-hourly services for which you intend to bill the client. For example, you might charge a flat fee to prepare a basic will.
To create a flat fee in the project Billing section:
-
Click the plus button. In the Flat Fee category, click the plus button to open the Add a Flat Fee modal.
- Confirm the date. The date will fill in automatically but can be edited.
- (Optional) Choose a template. You can use the “Flat Fee Name” field to search for a template. Once selected, the template automatically populates the description, price, and billing code fields (if applicable). You can still edit these fields if desired by clicking the pencil icon next to the respective field.
- Enter the quantity, price per unit, unit, description, and billing codes (if applicable). Fill in the other fields in the form as required. For quantity, enter the number of services provided, or enter “1” if the quantity is irrelevant. For price, enter the total amount to charge.
- (Optional) Attach relevant files. You can use the “Attachments” section to attach relevant documents to the flat fee item. Learn more about billing item attachments.
- Confirm billable and chargeable settings. Toggle the billable and chargeable options on or off as applicable.
- Save.
Billable and Chargeable
When adding or editing billing items, you can determine whether the item should be Billable and Chargeable. By default, both of these settings are toggled on.
Adjust these toggles based on how you want the item to interact with invoices:
- Billable and Chargeable: the item can be added to an invoice and charged to the client.
- Billable and NOT Chargeable: the item can be added to an invoice, but will not be charged to the client or affect the invoice total. Instead, the item will display a line-item total of $0.
- NOT Billable and NOT Chargeable: the item cannot be added to an invoice at all.
Note
An item cannot be Chargeable if the Billable setting is disabled.
Items with one or both of these settings disabled will be tagged as Not Billable or Not Chargeable in lists of billing items. Not Billable items will also appear in faded text.
Statuses
All billing item types include statuses indicating whether they have been invoiced, finalized, and more. The statuses are as follows:
- Draft: The billing item exists in draft form. This status applies only to time entries. Read the following section to learn more.
- Saved: The billing item has been saved in Filevine, but has not yet been added to an invoice.
- Invoiced: The billing item has been added to an invoice in Filevine, but the invoice has not yet been finalized.
- Pending Approval: The item has been marked as ready for the approver to review. This status is only available when a user is marked as the approver.
- Approved: The billing item has been marked as approved by the approver. The item is no longer editable.
- Finalized: The billing item is on a finalized invoice in Filevine. The item is no longer editable.
Draft Status
Time entries with the Draft status cannot be added to invoices. Draft status can be used to help keep track of time entries that may still need to be edited to become client-ready.
Time entries with the Draft status appear in the Timesheet and in the project Billing section. Draft time entries are not considered in Unbilled or Outstanding items. These entries are also excluded from calculations like Summary totals or totals listed in the Time Entries section in the Billing Section.
Un-invoiced time entries, marked with the Saved status, can also be moved to Draft status at any time. Once a time entry has been added to an invoice, however, it can no longer be moved to Draft status.
To make a time entry available for integrations or invoicing, the entry must first change status from Draft to Saved status. When a time entry with the Draft status is opened for editing, the Save as Draft option will be unselected by default. To keep the time entry in Draft status upon saving, make sure that you select Save as Draft. If you do not select Save as Draft, the entry will be moved to the “Saved” status upon saving, and will be available for invoicing and API integrations.
Add Files
When entering expenses and flat fees, users can either attach files from the project’s Docs section or upload files from their device.
Like other file attachment fields, there are two available options: a “Search for project documents” field and an upload button. To attach an existing file from the project, use the “Search for project documents” field to search for and select the desired document. To upload a file from your computer, click Upload a Doc.
Note
You can upload up to 10 files per billing item. Each individual file must be 5 GB or smaller. Supported file types: .pdf, .png, .jpg, .jpeg.
Click the caret next to an attached file to Download, Preview, or Remove the file.
In the project’s Billing section, the Expense and Flat Fee categories include a column that displays any file attachments. Select an attachment to open the file in a new browser tab. For billing items with multiple attachments, click the +(number) link to view and open the additional files.
All file attachments uploaded to an expense or flat fee item will also appear in the project’s Docs section. If desired, you can set billing item attachments to auto-move to the desired folder.
Comments
0 comments
Article is closed for comments.