Each aspect of law firm accounting is explained understandably and concisely. Once you understand the basics, consider hiring an accountant, either as a contractor or as an employee. They can help level up your firm and make the legal accounting process even smoother by adding legal accounting and legal practice management software to your firm’s toolkit.

Legal practice management software solutions that include trust accounting software allow law firms to handle firm financials and legal trust accounts with ease. CosmoLex’s legal trust accounting software was designed for trust accounts, with built-in features that ensure compliance with complex legal standards. We get it, sometimes you want to try before you commit to a new legal practice management software, especially when your firm’s legal compliance with trust accounts is on the line. That is why we offer a free 10-day trial of CosmoLex for interested law firms (with no credit card required) and schedule free demos for interested customers. Trust accounting is a form of law firm accounting that manages client funds held in trust accounts.

Determine how your firm will get paid

An attorney is required to reconcile their trust bank statement to their client’s individual balance on a quarterly, or even monthly basis. In fact, some bookkeeping tools such as QuickBooks and Xero integrate with your practice management tool, allowing you to easily track your clients, invoices, and more. Make sure whatever tool you use integrates properly or choose an all-in-one software for both. If you want your firm to stay compliant, be financially successful, and grow, you need to have an accurate and clear bookkeeping system for your law firm to follow. This could mean taking on bookkeeping tasks in-house or hiring a professional bookkeeper with experience working with law firms.

Uptime Legal continues to innovate and disrupt the legal tech industry. Under Dennis’ leadership, Uptime Legal has grown organically and through acquisitions to become the nationally-recognized legal technology company it is today. There are other types of deductions you need to keep track of that incur while doing business.

Find a law firm accounting service

With the knowledge you’ve gained, you’re well on your way to better financial health. The hope is that, by knowing where your money is coming and going, you can spend more wisely and capitalize on valuable opportunities. Your firm needs to keep track of your invoices so you know what money is owed (and who you owe money to) to avoid this problem. When you don’t collect funds that you’re owed, you miss out on revenue and are essentially working for free. And when you’re missing out on 12% of your billable hours, that’s 4.8 hours in a standard 40-hour workweek.

• We strive to cultivate a personal environment where each client receives professional, consistent and dependable advice.
• As a business owner, you’re required to keep your law firm compliant.
• But setting up your finances properly won’t just make it easier to file your taxes each year—it’ll save you time, money, stress, and potentially legal trouble (yes, really!).
• Where everyone else offers bulky, bloated, and overpriced products, Trustbooks is sleek, efficient, and reasonably priced.
• I helped switch us from Quicken (the PERSONAL accounting software) to QuickBooks Online.
• Regardless of the size of your law firm — even if you’re a solopreneur — it’s important to know accounting and bookkeeping basics.

Some software platforms allow you to use accrual-based books for monthly management of the firm while also creating cash-basis statements for preparing tax returns. Look into the pros and cons of both methods for your firm, then be consistent going forward to ensure your records are accurate and easy to track. Trust accounts are one of the most common areas where legal accounting mistakes are made. Whether you mismanage the accounts, put funds in the wrong account, accidentally use funds, or fail to report correctly, trust accounting errors are a big deal in accounting for law firms. Trust accounting mistakes can lead to penalties, suspension, or even losing the right to practice law.

Never record a trust deposit as income

We use bank-grade 256-bit SSL encryption standards to protect all data. We require two-factor authentication to be used by each CosmoLex user, to prevent unauthorized accounting system access. Finally, on each account, security permissions can be customized, so only law firm bookkeeping the appropriate law firm employees can access the necessary information. It can be challenging balancing these opposing motivations, and we can help, with suggestions as to credit management, receivables control and collection, and regular review of accounts.

• A double entry system, therefore, has two equal and corresponding sides—or debits and credits—and creates a balance sheet consisting of assets, liabilities, and equity.
• Without the proper business bank accounts, you risk inaccurate bookkeeping, messy records, and potential compliance violations regarding trust funds.
• In addition to keeping all data stored close to home, we use other cybersecurity best practices, like requiring two-factor authentication on all accounts.
• Generate statements such as cash flow, profit and loss, balance sheets, etc.
• To practice law legally, attorneys must also pass the bar exam in the state where they want to work, be it for a law firm or a company.

A retainer agreement helps establish terms for your services and payment. Learn how to set up your own retainer agreements and improve stability for your practice. Have hard and soft costs sorted for you, from direct or third-party products or services you’re paying on behalf of the client, to assets and debts.

Bookkeeping Services

The best solution is to open up a business credit card and record expenses on that card, ensuring that you won’t forget them even if you are keeping up with your books on a weekly or monthly basis. Now that you understand that bookkeeping happens first, I suggest you figure out the best way to handle bookkeeping before we move on to legal accounting. And law schools don’t really go into how to manage these accounts properly, so we see a lot of lawyers going in blind.

• For example, when you send an invoice to a client, you’ll mark it as revenue, even though you might not get paid for 30 days.
• With that information, you can better understand your firm’s financial health and plan for the coming months.
• If you want your firm to be financially healthy and thrive well into the future, you need to pay attention to your finances.
• If you’re going to make an accounting error, it’ll likely be with your trust and IOLTA accounts.
• Failure to allocate appropriately can lead to inaccurate books, and battle compliance issues.
• Easily integrate your FreshBooks accounting system with other apps and partners to simplify things like time management, payroll, and scheduling software.
• But if you’re confident that you can strategically use a credit card to grow your business and pay off your bill in full each month, having a business credit card can be helpful.

If you’ve ever balanced your checkbook, or simply compared the balances in your bank account and your company books to make sure they match, you’ve already performed a two-way reconciliation. But if you’re confident that you can strategically use a credit card to grow your business and pay off your bill in full each month, having a business credit card can be helpful. Whether you’re a small law firm or large, follow the steps in this guide, and get on the path to financial clarity and success. Now you cross off law bookkeeping out of your to-do list and feel stress-free about the financial aspect.