Tag Archives: email second round

Lesson #142

Connect – Transcript Packages function

Bundle transcripts with hyperlinked exhibits, video, PDF transcripts, and other related files, so your clients can view, highlight, and comment on transcripts and bundled files in browsers and on mobile devices. Your clients can also export different versions of the transcript and download the associated files.

RB9’s Transcript Packages are interactive transcripts clients can view in RB Connect in web browsers and RB Connect Mobile (RBCM) on mobile devices. Users can:

• Download/view attached files
• View streaming video
• Comment on transcripts and exhibits
• Highlight text
• Export transcripts in a variety of formats — including their highlights and comments

The Transcript Packages function is included free in RB9, but requires RB Connect for your clients to use it. Transcript Packages are readable in RB Connect on desktop computers and laptops. If you add RBCM to your system, your clients can easily work with their Transcript Packages in an environment designed for the smaller screens of iPhones or other mobile devices — no pinching and zooming to read and interact with their transcripts.

Producing interactive transcripts vs. PDF transcripts

If you already provide RB-PDF Transcripts to your clients, your production staff will find the process of creating Transcript Packages familiar yet faster. For example Transcript Packages — like RB-PDF Transcripts — are created using the original ASCII file. And the linking process is exactly the same as exhibit linking in RB9’s PDF Transcript Creator.

Where it saves staff time is that they do not have to customize the appearance of transcripts. If your clients want their transcripts to look a certain way, they choose customization options when exporting files from Transcript Packages in a browser or on their mobile devices.

Like RB-PDF Transcripts your production staff can preview Transcript Packages before releasing them. Then they notify clients automatically via email when their packages are available.

Unlike PDF transcripts, there is no physical file to deliver and your clients do not need a third-party application like Adobe Acrobat to read and work with their transcripts. Your staff cannot apply digital signatures or transcript stamps to Transcript Packages — but they do offer end users export options for:

• PDF
• Condensed PDF
• Amicus-formatted ASCII
• Word lists
• Word indexes
• Highlights
• Notes

Assembling transcript packages

You can assemble a Transcript Package after uploading an ASCII transcript to a witness repository in RB9 and publishing it to RB Connect. (If you don’t want to make the ASCII file available to your client before you create the Transcript Package, you can wait to publish the ASCII until you have created the package and are ready to notify the client.)

To create a Transcript Package use the search criteria in the Transcript Package function to find the right ASCII file. You can search by one or more of the following criteria:

• Job number
• Job date or date range
• Witness name
• One/some/all of your business units

In the returned results, files are listed by job number, job date, witness name, file name, case, and date the ASCII file was uploaded. You can sort your results in the grid by one or more columns in ascending or descending order (but when you exit the function, RB9 will revert back to the default order). Export the list as an Excel spreadsheet or a CSV (comma-separated values) file to save, print, share, or use in other applications.

Any Transcript Packages that were already created and fit your search criteria are also listed along with who created them and when. You can easily tell which is which because ASCII files are indicated by a radio button. Finished Transcript Packages do not have a button — instead the file name is hyperlinked to the package so you can manage the attached files, preview the package, and send the client a notice that the package is ready and waiting on their RB Connect.

When you create a Transcript Package any exhibits, video, and other files that were uploaded to the related job’s witness repository are available to bundle with the interactive transcript. You choose which ones to include — and like the returned results list — you can export any of these sub-lists as Excel spreadsheets or CSV (comma-separated values) files to save, print, share, or use in other applications.

When you create a package that includes exhibits you can have RB9 automatically add hyperlinks to the exhibits in the transcript the same way you link exhibits in RB-PDF Transcripts.

After generating the package you can preview it to check for errors and missing attachments and that any attached video streams correctly before sending an email notification to alert the client. The Transcript Package preview screen is the same as the Transcript Packages screen in RB Connect/RBCM (minus the ability to make or export highlights and comments), so you can be confident about sharing the final product.

Sharing transcript packages

Before sharing Transcript Packages with clients, customize your Connect preferences:

• Turn on Transcript Packages accessibility so your clients can see uploaded Transcript Packages.
• Select one of your RB-PDF Transcript templates as the default for your clients’ export specifications. Your clients cannot select a different template but they can change some of the specs — including margins, borders, font, Q&A styling, timestamp location, and PDF format (regular PDF or one of the more restrictive PDF/A formats for archiving purposes), when exporting a transcript.
• Customize the contents and appearance of the email notifying clients that a package is available. You can edit the default contents and style the appearance of the body of the email with text formatting, images, color, hyperlinks, and tables.
• Insert contextual data fields into the email subject and body so RB9 will automatically insert relevant data into Transcript Package notification emails. You can have RB9 include the file name, case name and number, job date and number, and witness in the subject and body of emails — plus you can have the direct URL for the Transcript Package inserted into the email body so your clients only have to click the link to go directly to their package instead of having to search for it in their RB Connect.

If you set the ASCII file to publish before creating the Transcript Package the package will be automatically available on RB Connect for the client to work with as soon as you create it. If you didn’t set the ASCII to publish beforehand RB9 will remind you when you attempt to send the notification email alerting the client to its availability on their RB Connect. Once you publish the ASCII file RB9 will publish the Transcript Package as well and you can alert the client.

When you send the notification email RB9 records the email sent in the Email Log function in Tools so you can refer back to it later.

Managing transcript packages

Other things you can do in the Transcript Packages function:

• Download the original ASCII file of any package.
• Search for text in a transcript.
• Skip directly to any page of a transcript.
• Export an AMICUS version of a transcript.
• Export PDF versions of the full-size transcript, condensed transcript, word index, or word list.
• Delete any Transcript Package you no longer need.

NOTE: This is an RB9-only function. It is not included in RB Lite.

TL;DR: Create interactive transcripts clients can work with in RB Connect in web browsers and RB Connect Mobile on mobile devices. Bundle related exhibits, videos, and other files with the transcripts, then automatically upload the packages and notify clients. 

RB concepts in this lesson

RB Connect: Online repository, calendar, and access to your office for clients and resources — including interactive transcripts, downloadable invoices and e-commerce for clients, and online turn-in, one-touch job acknowledgements, and downloadable pay statements for resources. RB Connect is an optional plug-in to RB9. More >

RB Connect Mobile: Clients and resources can access your RB Connect on their smartphones and tablets in an interface optimized for mobile devices. RB Connect Mobile is an optional plug-in to RB Connect. More >

RB-PDF Transcript: PDF version of a transcript with built-in transcript-specific features like hyperlinked exhibits, word lists/indexes, errata sheets, and enhanced headers/footers containing case and depo information from your RB9 database. It can be branded and customized extensively to match client requirements — and can include digital signatures, condensed transcripts, security restrictions, stamps, and archival formats for the courts. More >

Transcript Package: Bundle containing interactive transcripts with all of their related files (exhibits, videos, RB-PDF transcripts, etc.) to be viewed in a browser through RB Connect and RB Connect Mobile. More >

Lesson #140

Connect – Publish COD Invoices function

If you allow clients to make payments via RB Connect and RB Connect Mobile (RBCM), your COD clients can also use them to pay invoices before downloading transcripts online and on smartphones and other mobile devices.

CODs are handled differently

COD (Cash on Delivery) clients are handled differently from other clients. Traditionally COD invoices require the client to pay the invoice when presented — typically along with the items listed on the invoice. Often agencies have difficulty getting paid by COD clients because they are not regular clients. By offering COD clients the option to pay online or via mobile you guarantee you get paid before they can access the transcript — and they can get their transcripts as soon as the transcripts are ready.

Because RB does not regard COD invoices as sales they are not posted. (CODs are handled differently than sales to avoid overstating revenue and to minimize the number of voids that would occur to clear uncollectible CODs from your accounts receivable.) Since COD invoices are not posted, as a default they do not appear in RB Connect/RBCM. Use the Publish COD Invoices function to allow clients to pay for and download transcripts that were billed COD.

Manually publish CODs online

To give clients the ability to pay for COD invoices online you manually publish them to RB Connect in the Publish COD Invoices function. (When you publish an invoice to RB Connect it will also appear in the client’s RBCM if you offer that service.) The default view in Publish COD Invoices shows all outstanding COD invoices. (Invoices are designated as COD in Turn In.) For any invoice listed you can see at a glance:

• Invoice date and amount
• If it has already been published to RB Connect
• When the invoice was sent to the client
• Bill To and Sold To clients
• Job number and date
• Case name
• Assigned business unit

You can narrow the list to invoices generated within a range of dates, a single invoice number, job number, case, Bill To firm, and/or one or more of your business units. You can sort the list by one or more columns in ascending or descending order (but when you exit the function, RB will revert back to the default order). Export the list as an Excel spreadsheet or a CSV (comma-separated values) file to save, print, share, or use in other applications.

From the list you can choose which invoices to publish to RB Connect. You can also select invoices that have already been published and unpublish them so that they no longer appear in clients’ RB Connect/RBCM.

Set up for online payment first

Before your clients can pay invoices online in RB9 you must set up a business/merchant account with PayPal or one of the other accepted online payment processing services, then enter your credentials in Connect Preferences.

The default setting for RB Connect is no online payments. If you want to offer online payment of invoices including COD invoices through RB Connect, you must first set up an account with one of these services:

• PayPal
• Authorize.net
• First Data (Payeezy)
• Square
• Stripe

PayPal is easy to set up and integrate with RB9 and is a good choice if your clients have their own PayPal accounts. The other options are payment gateways — their benefit is that your clients do not have to have accounts with them to make payments through them.

In addition to setting up a merchant account and entering your credentials into RB9 you must choose which users are alerted in RB9 when a contact makes a payment online. You can also customize the email subject and message for payment receipt notices to clients.

NOTE: This is an RB9-only function. It is not included in RB Lite.

TL;DR: Because CODs are handled differently from sales, you must manually publish COD invoices to RB Connect so COD clients can pay online, then immediately download their transcripts.

RB concepts in this lesson

Bill To Contact: The contact responsible for paying the invoice for a job.

Bill To Firm: The firm responsible for paying the invoice for a job.

Business Unit (BU): One of your company’s revenue centers or any entity in your business that you want to track separately.

Job: Usually the reporting of a deposition but can also be any kind of service you provide with your reporters or other resources. More >

RB Connect: Online repository, calendar, and access to your office for clients and resources. More >

RB Connect Mobile: Clients and resources can access your RB Connect on their smartphones and tablets in an interface optimized for mobile devices. More >

Sold To Contact: Contact that ordered the services on the invoice.

Sold To Firm: Firm that ordered the services on the invoice.

Users: You and your staff who directly access RB.

Lesson #139

Connect – Transcript Ordered function

If you allow your clients to order transcripts through RB Connect and RB Connect Mobile (RBCM), the Transcript Ordered function is where you confirm, process, and monitor the progress of those back orders.

Clients can request transcripts on previously billed jobs in RB Connect/RBCM’s Order Transcript function. You confirm the back orders and process them through RB9. Clients can track confirmed requests in RB Connect/RBCM. And you can monitor the current status and view order details in the Transcript Ordered function.

Customize the function

Before using the Transcript Ordered function designate which staff members will be alerted when a back order request is received.

You can customize the transcript order request form with your own fields for clients to use to provide instructions — such as turnaround time, delivery options, and other directions that will minimize the need for any client back-and-forth while fulfilling back orders.

You can update your choices and customizations at any time.

View new back order requests

When someone back orders a transcript through RB Connect/RBCM, RB9 sends a pop-up message to the screen of all RB9 users you designated during setup. Alerted users can click through the message directly to the order in the Transcript Ordered function to confirm the order and start the production process.

If you prefer to batch process orders — or just want to check that you haven’t overlooked anything — you can use the Transcript Ordered function’s default view to see all unconfirmed transcript requests sent by clients through RB Connect/RBCM.

The default lists shows each request’s:

• Order date and time
• Contact ordering the transcript and their firm
• Witness
• Case
• Job number
• Job date

You can sort the list by one or more columns in ascending or descending order (but when you exit the function, RB9 will revert back to the default order). Export the list as an Excel spreadsheet or a CSV (comma-separated values) file to save, print, share, or use in other applications.

You can view details about any requested transcript’s associated job and previous invoice, along with client instructions for the back order. You confirm the back order job in this function by changing the job’s status to back order and generating a report that provides your staff with the information they need to process the order. You can export the report in a variety of formats, such as PDF or Excel, or print it to distribute to your staff.

Process & monitor back orders

Processing the order involves creating a task in the job for the transcript and assigning it to a resource, then notifying them about the assignment. The task window lists previous resources associated with the case to help you select the appropriate resource. As the order is produced and shipped you update its status in the job.

On the client side in RB Connect after they submitted a request, the job’s Request Order option disappears so they cannot accidentally back order more than one transcript for the job. They can review the details of their transcript order and monitor its progress.

You can also monitor a back order’s current status and view details using the Transcript Ordered function. You can search active back orders using any combination of:

• A particular date range
• A single order
• A single job
• A firm
• One or more of your business units

In addition to the information listed above for unconfirmed requests, the results include who on your staff confirmed each request and when. From the results returned you can view any transcript’s current status and order details.

NOTE: This is an RB9-only function. It is not included in RB Lite.

TL;DR: Confirm, process, and monitor transcript back orders clients make through RB Connect and RB Connect Mobile.

RB concepts in this lesson

Business Unit (BU): One of your company’s revenue centers or any entity in your business that you want to track separately.

Contact: Person who works for a firm you do business with, such as attorneys.

Firm: Company you do business with.

Job: Usually the reporting of a deposition, but can also be any kind of service you provide with your reporters or other resources. More >

RB Connect: Online repository, calendar, and access to your office for clients and resources. More >

RB Connect Mobile: Clients and resources can access your RB Connect on their smartphones and tablets in an interface optimized for mobile devices. More >

Resource: Person or thing that provides your business with a service — such as reporters.

Task: Service requested with a job, such as reporting, interpreting, or video, that require a separate resource (person, company, thing) to accomplish. Work performed in-house (such as creating condensed transcripts or shipping out finished products) is usually not considered a task in RB. More >

Lesson #136

Setup – System Preferences function

Entities System Preferences

Save time when entering new contacts, firms, and resources by specifying some defaults.

Autofill contact & resource names

If you enable Autofill for Contact and/or Resource names, RB will autofill the Full Name field when individual name fields (First Name, Mi., Last Name, Salutation) are entered in individual contact/resource listings. You choose which name fields automatically fill in and in which order.

Invoice options for firms

Default settings for new firms cover invoice options.

If you add late charges (one-time fee added to invoice balance after a certain number of days) and/or finance charges (monthly % of outstanding balance) to your invoices, you can set default percentages including up to 3 decimal placements. Similarly if you need to bill for state sales tax, you can include your sales tax rate as a percentage including up to 3 decimal placements.

You can specify how many days old an invoice has to be when you haven’t received payment yet before RB counts it as being past due and notifies you to start collection efforts.

You can also have RB detail services on invoices as the default for new firm entries.

You can change defaults for individual firms in their Firm listing.

Payment terms for resources

Default settings for new resources cover work schedules and payment terms for originals and copies.

The work schedule set here will appear as the default work schedule in individual resource listings.

RB will wait the number of days set here to release outstanding payables to resources. The number of days can range from 0 (zero) to 9999.

A term of 0 (zero) means you pay on bill-out: There is no waiting to pay resources. As long the invoice is within the cutoff date for the next payroll, it will be included in the payroll to pay to the resource. Cutoff dates are set up in combination with pay dates.

A term of 9999 means the resources won’t get paid for an invoice until the invoice balance reaches $0.

If you have specific wait periods — for example resources wait 2 weeks (14 days) to get paid for copies — you set the copy term to 14. RB will wait until invoices for copies reach 14 days old to be released for payment to the resource.

You can change defaults for individual resources in their Resource listing.

TL;DR: Set default invoice options for new clients and default payment terms for new resources.

RB concepts in this lesson

Firm: Company you do business with.

Resource: Person or thing that provides your business with a service — such as reporters.

Lesson #135

Setup – System Preferences function

Payables System Preferences

In addition to options for fixing printing problems on checks and 1099 forms, you can also set up direct deposit for payroll and other pay options.

1099 Form

In RB9 you have the ability to print each resource’s 1099 directly from the system. RB9 is designed to print in the correct fields on the 1099-NEC forms, but you can adjust the placement if needed to align the RB9 output with the 1099 form’s fields on your printer. Adjustments are in inches. You can increase (or decrease with a negative number) the top and left margins, using up to 2 decimal placements.

NOTE: Print 1099 Forms is an RB9-only function. It is not included in RB Lite.

Check

If you want to print checks directly from RB9, RB9 will create a PDF of the check information according to your settings to print on your own standard or voucher (2-part check) business checks. You can use Quickbooks-compatible laser checks (standard or voucher). Adjust where RB9 information is printing on your checks by increasing (or decreasing with a negative number) the top and left margins, using up to 2 decimal placements.

NOTE: Print Checks is an RB9-only function. It is not included in RB Lite.

NACHA (National Automated Clearing House Association)

Instead of printing checks or using a third-party payroll service, use RB9’s direct deposit feature to deposit pay into your resources’ accounts instead. After signing up for direct deposit with your bank use information provided by your bank to set up your system preferences for direct deposit payables. Some of the information you must get from your bank includes a unique 9-digit number assigned by the bank and a company ID number. (You will need to enter your resources’ banking information in their profiles.) Then all you have to do is send a NACHA-formatted file (exported from RB9) to your bank and your bank will transfer the funds for you.

NOTE: Direct deposit is an RB9-only function. It is not included in RB Lite.

Draft Pay Statement

Before closing, you can print out or email your resources a draft of their pay statements, so they can review which invoices they will be paid for and how much will be included in their next paycheck.

If you email draft pay statements, you can customize the email that accompanies them. Similarly to invoice emails set up in Billing preferences, you can change the default text in the Subject and Message fields and insert contextual data fields so that real data from RB related to the resource and payroll merge into the email automatically. You can also customize the appearance of the body of the emails with text formatting, colors, images, hyperlinks, and tables.

The draft pay statement itself will attach to the email as a PDF. And you can override the defaults set here in any pay statement emails sent from RB.

Pay Statement

After you run payroll in RB and close it, you can print out or email your resources their pay statements – which is the report that shows them exactly which invoices they were paid for on a closed payroll. You have the same settings options for pay statements as for draft pay statements.

Payroll

You have 2 options for when you pay resources:

1. “Hard Wait” is the default and refers to waiting a set number of days before releasing an invoice for payroll — regardless of whether you received payment from clients. (The default number of days to wait for originals and copies are set in Entities preferences, and can be overridden in individual resources’ settings.)
2. “Soft Wait” is similar in having your resources wait to get paid after a certain number of days — but there is an exception. If you receive payment for an invoice within the wait period, then RB will release the invoice to the resource in the next payroll you run.

TL;DR: Customize pay statement emails. Specify when resources get paid in relation to invoices. Adjust printing layouts for 1099s and checks. Set up your direct deposit account for paying resources.

RB concepts in this lesson

Resource: Person or thing that provides your business with a service — such as reporters.

Lesson #129

Setup – System Preferences function

RB comes with default options for its different functions. Some cannot be altered but generally you can customize functions to fit your company by editing, adding, and deleting options. System Preferences is where you set global options for different features in your RB system.

These global preference settings are used throughout your RB system by all users. You must be part of the Administrators group to change System Preference settings.

System preferences can be customized at any time. The only one you need to set before using RB is entering your company’s email settings in General > Email if you will be sending emails from RB.

Options you can customize in System Preferences include:

• Company email address(es)
• Text of “Forgot Password” emails
• Upgrade to Standard or downgrade to Lite editions of RB9. This feature is only available to Administrators.
• Which credit card to use for your RB subscription payments. You can also view your billing history and pay overdue invoices.
• How many Named User Licenses access your RB9
• Login security — such as requiring strong passwords and 2FA verification
• How long RB saves messages sent internally
• How long a period of inactivity allowed before RB logs a user off automatically
• Company time zone default & other time zones to select
• Job confirmations & cancellations
• Task assignments & cancellations
• Job statuses displayed as calendar search options
• Future calendar emails
• Holidays observed
• Job & task calendar view options
• Job status colors
• Job status automatic updates
• New job defaults
• Overdue tasks emails
• Resource Blast (last minute job announcement emails & texts) contents and defaults
• Zoom account settings, preferences, and other customizations
• Envelope printing specs
• FedEx & UPS account information
• Repository publishing default & use tracking options
• RB Digital Signature Proxy settings
• Invoices, statements, and payment receipts & related emails’ contents and other invoice options
• LEDES 1998B exported files
• Reward points
• Pay statements & related emails’ contents
• Payment wait periods
• 1099 Form & check printing
• Direct deposit payment settings
• Default settings for new firms, contacts, & resources
• QuickBooks settings
• Company contact information for RB Network membership
• Email Logs tracking

System Preferences sections

With so many options to describe each section is broken out into a separate lesson:

• General
• Calendar
• Production
• Billing
• Receivables
• Payables
• Entities
• Tools

System Preferences vs. Lists

RB separates out list customization from other system preferences. If you want different options in a list you would make those changes in the Lists function. All other options are grouped by module under System Preferences.

Some System Preferences options work with Lists — such as the file types you can have RB automatically attach to assignment notifications. They are generated in Lists under Repository, which you can then select from in System Preferences under Calendar.

Personal preferences

Some system preferences can be overridden by personal preferences set by individual users. Preferences that only affect your individual RB setup are available under User Preferences.

TL;DR: Use RB’s default options or customize these systemwide options to match your company.

RB concepts in this lesson

Administrator: RB user who has access to and control of all areas of RB. You can have any number of RB administrators but each RB system must have at least one administrator. Administrator rights include setting up user accounts, assigning users to groups (which authorize what actions users can perform in RB and what kinds of notifications and messages they receive), and setting global system preferences.

ReporterBase Digital Signature Proxy (RB-DSP): Free digital signatures for reporters and agencies that agencies apply to RB-PDF Transcripts. Reporters retain control of their signatures while agencies are able to apply the signatures through their normal production process. More >

RB-PDF Transcript: PDF version of a transcript with built-in transcript-specific features. More >

Users: You and your staff who directly access RB.

Lesson #122

Setup – Invoice Headers function

Invoices in RB include a short descriptive title called the invoice header. Standard invoice headers are automatically generated based on the service items you select for each witness listed on an invoice. If the standard headers aren’t accurate enough to cover your billing requirements, you can create your own invoice headers.

You can enter your own headers on the fly as you generate invoices. Or if you think you will be reusing the same headers, set them up in the Invoice Headers function. Then you can quickly select the correct header for a witness from a drop-down when generating invoices — saving time and reducing errors.

Create & organize headers

Create as many invoice headers as you need to cover all of your business’s different billing circumstances. If you have multiple custom headers, organize them into Header Groups. Header Groups are categories of invoice headers, and are set up in Lists. By organizing your custom headers into header groups, you will save time locating one when billing.

Creating new headers is easy. They only require the header content and header group. The header group defaults to the system default (selected in Lists), so you might only need to enter the content.

If you are creating multiple headers in one sitting, use the Save & New option to stay in the new header window, eliminating extra clicks to get back into the window. It will also keep the same header group you used in the last invoice header saved rather than resetting to the default, so that could also save you time.

You can add, edit, or delete invoice headers at any time. Headers are stored in the Invoice Header function, and the default lists all of your stored headers by Invoice Header Group. You can also view the list for a single group or multiple selected groups. Export the list as an Excel spreadsheet or CSV file to save, print, share, or use in other applications.

You can update the header content and/or header group for any custom invoice header. Or delete it if you don’t need it anymore.

Using custom invoice headers

After entering billing information to invoices in Turn In is when you would add custom invoice headers. You can apply the same custom header to multiple invoices at once. And use the Save and New feature to apply different invoice headers to different invoices without leaving the Set Invoice Headers panel in Turn In for greater efficiency. Custom headers are listed in the drop-down by their invoice group, so you can quickly find the correct header by looking within its group only.

TL;DR: If RB’s default invoice headers are not enough, create and save your own custom headers to apply during Turn In.

RB concepts in this lesson

Header Group: Parent structure that contains related invoice headers as its children.

Lesson #121

Setup – Pay Dates function

When setting up your RB system and then at the beginning of each year, set up the year’s pay dates and their corresponding cutoff dates (last date for invoices to be included in pay) for each time period you use to pay resources (e.g., monthly, weekly, etc.). By setting up pay dates in advance you can reduce the number of payroll errors caused by entering the wrong date when running payroll.

View existing pay dates

The Pay Dates function defaults to all pay dates entered this year. Each pay date listing shows the date, Pay Group (different time periods you use to pay resources, e.g., monthly, weekly, etc.), cut-off date, and the date the payroll was closed. You can either add dates to the current year or change the year — if you want to enter next year’s pay dates for example.

When viewing the list of pay dates, you can sort the list by one or more columns in ascending or descending order (but when you exit the function, RB will revert back to the default order). Export the list as an Excel spreadsheet or a CSV (comma-separated values) file to save, print, share, or use in other applications.

Pay dates & cutoff dates

When you enter a new pay date, you also enter the last date for invoices to be included in pay, i.e., the cutoff date. RB calculates resource payment cutoff dates using invoice dates by default. But you can also use the date invoices are paid as the cutoff date for specific resources or all resources paid for jobs tied to one or more of your company’s business units (BUs). This preference is set in individual resource listings (under Original Term and Copy Term) and your BU listings.

You further define pay dates by selecting which Pay Group you are paying and which BUs’ jobs are included. You can include a description of the pay date listing and other notes.

Designate responsible business unit

If you have multiple BUs, you can also designate which BU will be responsible for issuing 1099s for this pay date. Instead of having to create pay date listings for each of your BUs, you can include multiple BUs in one pay date listing, and designate one BU to be responsible for issuing all related 1099s. It doesn’t have to be the BU tied to the jobs being paid for, and the default is your main office.

You can have multiple pay date listings on the same calendar date — or if every Pay Group will have the same cutoff date and BU(s), you can set one pay date for all groups.

Correcting errors

If you made a mistake setting up a pay date, you can delete it if payroll for that date has not been closed yet. Otherwise, you can make a note in the pay date’s Remarks field for future reference.

TL;DR: Set up pay dates for different pay periods (and different business units in your company, if desired).

RB concepts in this lesson

Business Unit (BU): One of your company’s revenue centers or any entity in your business that you want to track separately — such as branch offices, other companies you own, affiliates, and profit-sharing operations.

Cutoff Date: Last date for invoices to be included in a pay date. Default is the date of the invoice, but you can use the date invoices were paid for a single resource or all resources tied to a business unit/multiple BUs in your company.

Pay Groups: Categories of time periods your company uses to pay resources, e.g., Monthly, Weekly, On Demand. Group resources according to their pay period (frequency) to reduce errors when running payroll.

Resource: Person or thing that provides your business with a service — such as reporters.

Lesson #118

Setup – Billing Rates function

Billing rates are the amounts you charge for services. These rates are organized into tables — so you can charge different clients different amounts for the same service items by applying different billing rate tables instead of having to enter rates each time you bill someone. You might charge different billing rates for the same service items based on negotiations with clients, networking rates with other agencies, or rates requested by an insurance company. Your multiple billing rate tables can contain the prices for all of your service items — so you can easily apply the correct prices when invoicing specific firms by selecting the appropriate table.

Set up Billing Rate Groups first

Before you start creating billing rate tables, set up Billing Rate Groups in the Lists function. Billing Rate Groups are groups of similar tables, so when billing you can search through a subset of your billing rate tables instead of the whole long list of tables each time you invoice a client. Set up basic categories/groups — such as Standard, Preferred, and for specific cases. You can also designate which Billing Rate Group is your default group that will appear when setting up new billing rate tables, new firms, new contacts, etc.

After setting up groups, use the Billing Rates function to add your billing rate tables within the groups. You can set up as many billing rate tables as you need in each group.

Add as many billing rates as you need

You can set up billing rate tables in 2 ways:

• From scratch
• From an existing table — copying and updating an existing table is a quicker way to create a new table because the existing table’s rates and details are duplicated in the new table for you to update.

Another way to save time is to set default billing rates, pay rates, and options for service items in the Service Item Master, then change them for specific situations by creating different rate tables with custom rates for the service items.  Every billing rate table you create in RB will automatically inherit all service items set up in the Service Item Master — including all default rates and options for each item as well. So if you set up defaults in the Service Item Master then you only have to update them as needed in individual rate tables.

Give each billing rate table you create a clearly specific name so your billing staff can easily understand when it should be used. Some examples would be Standard Rates, Preferred Rates, Medical-Technical, and Rates for [a specific law firm]. You can further segment your market by state and/or city if you charge different rates by location.

Add as many billing rates as you need

In each billing rate table you can customize the billing rate for each item. If there are service items that do not pertain to this billing rate, leave their billing rate at $0 and RB won’t bill for them when this billing rate table is used.

In addition to each service item’s billing rate you can also customize:

• The minimum invoice amount for the service item.
• The pay rate for resources, the minimum amount you pay resources for this item, and whether you pay your resources for the service item using a flat rate ($) scale or percentage (%). If you have service items that resources do not get paid on, leave them set at $0, and RB will not calculate pay for them. (You do not have to include pay rate information in your billing rate tables. You can use the Pay Rates function to set up separate pay rate tables which you can select when billing.)
•  If the billing amount and pay amount for this service item will have the Expedite/Rush amount added to it.
• Whether the item is court taxable and/or sales taxable.
• If you offer discounts on this particular service item. The percentage of discount that a client will receive on the service item is entered in their Firms setup.
• If you use the Reward Points System and the service item should be included in the revenue calculation to accumulate points.
• If you pay commissions on the service item to resources that bring in clients (Client Of) and/or account managers (Sales Reps).
• If you want the service item name and billing amount to appear on invoices. (If you set a firm to always print details on invoices in their Firm setup, then their invoices will be fully itemized, displaying all service items and billing amounts overriding whatever is specified here.)
• If you have the RB Connect plug-in, you can allow clients to request the service item when submitting an online job request and/or allow resources to select this service item during turn-in.
• If the service item needs your production department’s involvement, you can have it appear on Production Sheets which show them on a job-by-job basis who is ordering and what they’re ordering that needs to be produced.
• LEDES codes required by clients for e-billing.

In addition to customizing the billing rates you can also make adjustments to each Rush Type in the table if needed. All Rush Types are automatically inherited from the Rush Type Master. You can also include any relevant notes or comments in a rate table.

Manage billing rates

You can update any information in a billing rate table at any time except its Billing Rate Group. You can delete any billing rate table that hasn’t been used. If you can’t delete a table, you can de-activate it so it does not appear in lists. And you can update rates in multiple billing rate tables at once in the Service Item Master.

To find a billing rate table to copy, update, delete, or de-activate, you can search your entire set of billing rate tables or narrow your search to a specific Billing Rate Group, state, city, and/or billing rate table name. You can also choose to search all tables or only active tables. RB lists the results by Billing Rate Group and includes each table’s name, its state and/or city (if applicable), and its Active status.

You can sort your results in the grid by one or more columns in ascending or descending order (but when you exit the function, RB will revert back to the default order). Export your search results as an Excel spreadsheet or a CSV (comma-separated values) file to save, print, share, or use in other applications. You can also sort and export the service item and rush type lists in each billing rate table.

Attach billing rates to entities

After setting up Billing Rate Groups and billing rate tables, attach entities to the rate tables. You connect billing rates to firms, contacts, and parties to a case/job. You can do this when you set them up or at any time afterwards. Contacts inherit billing rate tables from their firms but you can select different tables for contacts from their firm’s. Parties will default to the billing rate tables in their contact profile. You can override the default when adding parties to cases/jobs or when turning in jobs.

Apply billing rates

When creating an invoice in Turn In, RB will select the billing rate table connected to the designated Bill To contact. You can select a different rate table for this invoice and you can override any charge on individual invoices.

TL;DR: Set up multiple billing rate tables so you can automatically charge different amounts to different clients for the same service items based on prices you negotiate with clients.

RB concepts in this lesson

Billing Rate Groups: Umbrella structures aimed at categorizing your billing rates. Instead of one long list of billing rates, Billing Rate Groups create a series of shorter lists to search through.

Bill To Contact: The contact responsible for paying the invoice for a job.

Client Of: Resource that receives a commission for jobs their clients scheduled or that are part of a case the resource was designated as the Client Of resource. You can also give reporters right of first refusal on their clients/cases’ jobs by displaying unassigned jobs from their clients/cases in Resource-side online calendars in RB Connect.

Contact: Person who works for a firm you do business with, such as attorneys.

Firm: Company you do business with. They schedule depositions with you, e.g., a law firm, or they are a third party that pays you, e.g., an insurance company.

Job: Usually the reporting of a deposition, but can also be any kind of service you provide with your reporters or other resources. More >

RB Connect: Online repository, calendar, and access to your office for clients and resources. More >

Resource: Person or thing that provides your business with a service, such as reporters.

Lesson #113

Setup – Users and Groups function

You can run RB as a single user, but if you have other in-house personnel who need access to your RB, set them up as users. Then give them user names and passwords to access RB, and store work-related and personal information about them. Group them according to their access levels and job functions so they can perform their jobs and receive internal messages, but not access areas of RB you do not want them to use. 

Groups give users defined access

Users and Groups is the tool you use to manage RB users, individually and grouped according to permissions, rights, and notifications. There are 2 default groups in RB:

1. Administrators, which grants group members full access to all areas of RB
2. Users, which is the basic group every RB user is part of and grants them limited access to only essential areas of RB.

The initial user of your RB system is designated as an administrator so they can enter other users and grant them permissions. They can add other users to the Administrators group, and anyone who is an administrator in RB can perform the same functions. There is no limit to how many administrators your system can have.

Security Groups

Administrators can set up Security Groups in addition to the default groups, which can have different access to RB functions. For example, you could set up a Calendar group, in which you give access to all Calendar functions in RB and maybe some select functions in other modules, such as the repository and entities.

When setting up a new group the only required information is the Group Name. Other information you can add to a group is a group description, group members (RB users), and security permissions/function access.

There are 2 levels to security permissions:

1. Simple access — Users in the group can search and view information, i.e., a read only level.
2. Comprehensive access — Users can also edit and delete information.

Most functions offer comprehensive access only, but in some functions you can limit access to read only. Functions that offer both access levels are generally more critical areas — such as cases, jobs, and invoices — which you might want to allow some users to view but not change.

In addition to setting up Security Groups, administrators can:

• Add or delete users from each group (one user, several, or all users at once).
• Change which functions are accessible in a group (except the Administrators group).
• Delete groups (except the Administrators and Users groups).

Users can be members of more than one group so you do not have to have a lot of groups to cover every option. If someone’s responsibilities overlap different areas — such as someone who oversees both calendaring and billing — administrators can give that person access to both areas through membership in multiple Security Groups.

While members of the Administrators group have all of the capabilities described by default, they can also grant members of other Security Groups the same capabilities if desired.

Message Groups

In addition to Security Groups RB also has Message Groups, which allow you to send a message to all the members of a group simultaneously. Members of a Message Group can also send messages to the group. There are no required Message Groups nor are users required to be a member of any Message Group to use RB.

Similarly to Security Groups the only requirement when setting up a Message Group is a group name. Administrators can also add a group name, and add or delete members. Administrators can edit or delete existing Message Groups.

With either group you can sort the list by one or more columns in ascending or descending order (but when you exit the function RB will revert back to the default order).

Adding users

When you open the Users and Groups function it lists all of the users who are already entered into your RB system — along with their user name, email address, whether they are an active user, and when they last logged into the system. You can sort the list by one or more columns in ascending or descending order (but when you exit the function RB will revert back to the default order). You can also export the list as an Excel spreadsheet or a CSV (comma-separated values) file to save, print, share, or use in other applications.

Administrators can add users to RB at any time. When entering a new user the only required information is their full name, RB login name, and password. When saving a new user RB will prompt you to tie them to your company’s business units (BUs). You can tie them to one or more of your company’s BUs.

If you are using email addresses as user login names you will be required to enter the user’s email address instead of a login name. We recommend this option because everyone knows their email address so it is easier for them to remember than a unique user name for their RB user ID. The option to use email addresses for RB login is a general system preference.

General information

In addition to required information you can store users’ contact information— such as their work email address, and other work related information, including their work phone number, start date/termination date, title and department (which you choose from lists you customized in the Lists function), the user’s supervisor, and any information you want to include that is not covered elsewhere in the user’s listing.

In addition to storing info about the user this is also where administrators can:

• Reset the user’s password for them if they forgot their password and don’t want to change it themselves (administrators do not have a way to retrieve passwords).
• Let the user back into RB if they got locked out for making too many incorrect attempts to log in (using the wrong user name and/or password). Administrators set how many tries users get to log in correctly before being locked out in System Preferences.
• Deactivate the user if they no longer work for the company or otherwise don’t need to be assigned or contacted anymore. Deactivated users can no longer log into RB and their names will not appear in the system by default.
• Delete a user if they never did anything in the system. RB tracks and logs user interactions so if someone has added or updated information in RB, they cannot be deleted from the system because their interactions are part of your audit trail.

Personal info

Personal information about a user includes their home address, date of birth, and personal phone numbers. When entering the user’s street address or P.O. box number, skip the other fields and enter the zip code. RB will fill in the city, state, and country for you. After entering the user’s address you can view maps and directions to it in RB.

After saving a new user, 2 other panes appear in their listing: Groups and Business Units. Groups will have the default Users group listed and Business Units will list any BUs you tied to the user. You can add or delete groups and business units you want to associate with the user here.

Who gets RB access?

Clients or resources who need access to their information in your system are not the same as RB users who are your staff, managers, or other company personnel who need access on a more global level. If you want to give your clients and resources access to their calendars, financial info, files, and other relevant info, add RB Connect to your RB system, where they can have their own online RB offices automatically populated with their information exclusively. Add RB Connect Mobile to give them similar access on their iPhones and other mobile devices.

TL;DR: Store work and personal information about company personnel. Give them access to specific functions in RB through Security Groups, and communicate internally with multiple users at once through Message Groups.

RB concepts in this lesson

Business Unit (BU): One of your company’s revenue centers or any entity in your business that you want to track separately.

Job: Usually the reporting of a deposition but can also be any kind of service you provide with your reporters or other resources — such as realtime, videoconferencing, or read & sign. More >

RB Connect: Online repository, calendar, and access to your office for clients and resources — including interactive transcripts, downloadable invoices and e-commerce for clients, and online turn-in, one-touch job acknowledgements, and downloadable pay statements for resources. More >

RB Connect Mobile: Clients and resources can access your RB Connect on their smartphones and tablets in an interface optimized for mobile devices. More >