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Add a Soft Cost

Soft costs are also known as indirect costs or cost recovery. They are “in-house” items generally considered part of your firm’s overhead, a portion of which may be attributed to your client.

Examples include:

  • Photocopies
  • Printing
  • Long-distance phone calls

As a firm, you need to decide how to seek reimbursement for these items. You may choose to absorb the cost and not charge your client, add a  % fee to every invoice, or itemize these charges. Soft cost entry is meant for those who wish to itemize. If you wish to charge a  % fee, you can add an overhead charge.

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Add a Soft Cost

You can add a soft cost from:

Global Add Shortcut

    1. From toolbar atop the screen, click the Global Add Shortcut (plus sign).
    2. From the drop-down that displays, click Expense (Soft Cost).
      The Add Expense screen opens.

Matter Landing Page

    1. From the left navigation panel, click Matters.
    2. On the Matters screen, double-click the matter and scroll down to view the matter details.
    3. Click on the ‘Billing‘ tab.
    4. Click to +Add Expense > Soft Cost. 
    5. On the Add Expense drawer that opens to the right, enter the details, or click to expand the expense card to fullscreen by clicking on the < arrow on the top-left.
    6. Enter all applicable information for your expense card.
    7. Click Save.

Time & Expense Screen

  1. From the left navigation panel, click Billing.
  2. From the Billing menu, click Time & Expense.
  3. From the toolbar on the Time & Expense screen, click +Add Expense > Soft Cost. 
  4. On the Add Expense drawer that opens to the right, enter the details, or click to expand the expense card to fullscreen by clicking on the < arrow on the top-left.
  5. Enter all applicable information for your expense card.
  6. Click Save.

Soft Cost Fields

Info Section

Timekeeper
Date
  • This date will default to today’s date but can be changed if needed. This is the date that will be displayed on the invoice.
Expense
  • Click an expense from the drop-down list, or enter one into the field.
  • You can customize your drop-down list.
  • If you choose the “Group identical soft cost charges for Invoice Printing” option when generating a bill, this expense name must be identical for those items to the group.
  • If this is an eBilling-enabled file, you will see ‘E’ codes listed instead.
Description

Amount Section

Quantity
  • Quantity of items associated with this expense. For example, if you are billing $0.25 a copy for 50 copies, you would enter the quantity as 50.
  • Defaults to 1
Rate/Price
  • Expense amount. For example, if you are billing $0.25 a copy for 50 copies, you would enter the Rate/Price as 0.25.
  • This amount can be up to 5 decimal points.
  • You can standardize rates or prices for commonly used expenses.
  • To add a negative rate, enable negative soft cost expense under Setup > Firm Setting > Accounting.
Value
  • This is the amount billed to the client.
  • Value = Quantity x Rate/Price
    • Billing @ $0.25 a copy for 50 copies would result in a 0.25 x 50 = $12.50 value.

Advanced Settings Section

BILLING INFO TAB
Billing Status Billable
  • This is the default option.
  • The expense will be included in the unbilled balance and displayed on your next invoice.
No Charge
  • Items you are completing free of charge, but you want the value displayed on the invoice. For example, Value: $200 Charge: $0.00.
Non-Billable
  • Items you want to track for internal rather than billing purposes.
  • Not listed on the invoice.
Hold
  • Check this box to place the expense on hold.
  • The next time you invoice your matter, this item will not be included.
  • When you are ready to bill for it, edit the expense and un-check this box to free it for billing.
  • Tip: On the time/expense tab you can use the filters (on the right) to show items on hold.
Flag
  • You can flag the timecard with a priority billing level.
  • This assigns a red (critical), green (normal), or blue (low), flag next to the item on the time/expense grid.
NOTES TAB
Notes
  • For Internal use only.
  • Any notes entered will not be displayed on the invoice.
TAX TAB
Taxable Unchecked
  • If this setting is unchecked, no tax will apply to this entry.
Checked
  • If this setting is checked, you can review the rates applied to this entry (as determined by the matter setting) and can make changes if needed. These changes will only apply to this entry.

Documents Section

Add and manage documents associated with the expense.

Save Options

Click on the arrow beside Save to select between two options from the drop-down:

  • Click Save and New to save the expense and enter another soft cost right away. Helpful for bulk entry.
  • Click Save to save the expense and return to the Time/Expense screen.
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