Recording manual bill payments accurately keeps a client's balance up to date and your firm's accounts reconciled. You record payments received outside Clio Payments, apply client funds already held for a client, and track their history. Complete records show what has been paid, what is outstanding, and where every payment was allocated.
Note: This article covers payments recorded outside Clio Payments, such as cash, cheque, wire transfer, or client funds already held for a client. To record a payment from client funds, see Apply Client Funds to Bills. To record a credit card or Pay by Bank payment processed through Clio Payments, see Record and Manage Online Bill Payments.
Understand manual payment sources
- Direct payment:
Record a payment received outside Clio Payments, such as cash, cheque, wire transfer, or ACH.
- Other:
Record a payment from an external platform such as peer-to-peer payment options or a credit card processed outside Clio Payments.
- Client account:
Apply client funds already received at the client or matter level towards a bill.
Record a single bill or multi-matter bill payment
You record payment for a single bill and a multi-matter bill in the same way. A multi-matter bill is one bill that includes activities for multiple matters belonging to one client.
Note: On a multi-matter bill, payment applies to the oldest created matter first.
- Go to the Billing tab, or the Bills subtab in a matter or contact.
- Select the Unpaid subtab.
- In the Actions column, next to Send, click the down arrow and select Record payment.
- Select one of the options for the Payment source, the deposit account, payer, and amount paid.
- When the amount paid is less than the amount due, you can write off the remaining amount and add a description or note.
- If you use multiple currencies, and the client's payment currency differs from the bill or deposit account currency, the applicable conversion rate and any conversion loss or gain will be shown at the time of payment:
- If the payment currency differs from the selected deposit account currency: Losses will be written off if the client paid the invoice amount(s) in full.
- If the payment currency differs from the bill currency and results in an underpayment at the time of the deposit/payment: You can opt to write off the remaining amount.
- If the payment currency differs from the bill currency and results in an overpayment at the time of the deposit/payment: The invoice will be considered paid in full.
- Click Record payment.
Record payment for one client's multiple bills
Note: You cannot record payments for bills belonging to different clients at the same time.
- In Clio Manage, click Billing.
- Click Record payment.
- Search for the client. All unpaid bills for that client appear.
- Select one of the options for the Payment source, the deposit account, payer, and amount paid.
- When the amount paid is less than the amount due, you can write off the remaining amount and add a description or note.
- If you use multiple currencies, and the client's payment currency differs from the bill or deposit account currency, the applicable conversion rate and any conversion loss or gain will be shown at the time of payment:
- If the payment currency differs from the selected deposit account currency: Losses will be written off if the client paid the invoice amount(s) in full.
- If the payment currency differs from the bill currency and results in an underpayment at the time of the deposit/payment: You can opt to write off the remaining amount.
- If the payment currency differs from the bill currency and results in an overpayment at the time of the deposit/payment: The invoice will be considered paid in full.
- Click Record payment.
Record bill payments from client funds
If your client has client funds on the client or matter level, you can record payment for a bill from the client funds. You can record payment and apply client funds at the same time as the bill approval process or after a bill has already been approved.
When paying bills with client-level client funds, Clio Manage generates three distinct transactions to accurately represent the movement of funds. These transactions record: a transfer to the matter balance (the system prevents edits to this transaction), a transfer from the client-level client funds, and a transfer to your operating account to pay the invoice.
Apply client to individual bills
- Go to Billing or the Bills subtab in a matter or contact.
- Select either the Draft or Pending approval subtab.
- Click the down arrow next to Edit and select Approve & apply client.
- Select your operating account as the destination account for payment.
- Click Approve & apply client.
- Go to Billing or the Bills subtab in a matter or contact.
- Select the Unpaid subtab.
- Click the down arrow next to Send and select Record payment. You can also click Record payment in the upper right corner.
- If your client has client funds, you will see a table showing the amounts on the matter and contact levels. From the Source dropdown, select your client’s client funds.
- Complete the remaining details.
- Click Record payment.
Apply client to multiple bills
You can also perform bulk actions to approve bills or to apply client to approved bills
- Go to Billing or the Bills subtab in a matter or contact.
- Select either the Draft or Pending approval subtab.
- Use the checkboxes to select relevant bills.
- Make sure not to select any client requests. If you accidentally do select a client request, it will be excluded from the next action.
- Click the down arrow at the top of the table and select Approve & apply client.
- Select your operating account as the destination account for payment.
- Click Approve & apply client.
- Go to Billing or the Bills subtab in a matter or contact.
- Select the Unpaid subtab.
- Use the checkboxes to select relevant bills.
- Make sure not to select any client requests. If you accidentally do select a client request, it will be excluded from the next action.
- Click the down arrow at the top of the table and select Apply client.
- A modal will appear with a summary list of the funds that will be applied to each bill. The summary list will only provide details of funds available to apply to the bills you selected. If you selected a bill, but no funds are available, no further action will occur for that bill.
- Select the destination account.
- Click Apply client.
The Job status page will show you which bills were successfully approved and client applied (Apply client complete) and which bills were approved without applying client (Approve invoice complete). The latter scenario occurs if no client funds are available.
View bill payment history
After a payment is recorded, you can see which firm user recorded it in three places.
- Bill Timeline:
Open a bill and, under Bill Timeline, view its creation and payment history.
- Firm Feed:
Go to Dashboard > Firm Feed, click Filter, and under Type select Bill payment or Client funds request payment.
- Matter Timeline:
Open the matter Dashboard, scroll to Timeline, and filter by bill payment or client funds request.
Up next
- Edit and Delete Bill Payments: Change or remove a recorded bill payment.
- Record Payments on Client Funds Requests: Record a client fund deposit before you apply it to a bill.