Clio Manage offers flexible options for managing user permissions through system standard roles and custom roles. You will need to assign every firm user a role. These roles control what users see and do within Clio Manage, ensuring they have the correct access level to perform their duties efficiently while protecting confidential client data.
Understand standard roles and custom roles
In Clio Manage, you can choose from five standard roles or create custom roles to fit your firm's unique needs. Standard roles are a great starting point for new firms, and you can use them as templates for custom roles. The sections below outline the core functions of each standard role and the non-configurable permissions.
Note: Non-configurable permissions are built into standard roles and carry over when you use them as a template for a custom role.
Administrator
Assign this role to firm users, managing partners, or anyone who requires full access to all firm settings, user management, and data. Administrators have maximum access, resulting in several non-configurable permissions.
Important: The Firm Feed is only visible to users with the Administrator role by default. To give other users access, create a custom role, and enable the View account firm feed permission under the Firm Settings section. You can assign roles immediately after creation.
What an Administrator can do:
- Manage contacts, matters, and documents.
- View all firm activities and financial information.
- Manage users and roles.
- Access and configure all firm settings.
- Accounts: View, create, edit, delete, export, and manage transactions and bank accounts.
- Activities: View all categories, bulk edit bills, and billed items.
- Calendars: Manage all calendars
- Conflict Checks: Create, view, and manage conflict checks. Administrators can also view the conflict check report, bypassing matter and contact visibility permissions
- Dashboard: View firm dashboard
- Documents: Unlock user-locked documents
- Matters: Administer stages and templates, manage billing preferences, and block users.
- Payments: Manage Clio Payments, including payment plans and charges. Admins can also administer merchant accounts, view tax forms, and sign up.
- Reports: View, create, download, and manage report presets and schedules.
- Settings: Manage bill syncs, billing, documents, expenses, firm settings, grants, and matter numbering.
- Tasks: Manage, bulk edit, and bulk delete tasks.
- Transactions: View, edit, export, and manage all transactions, including trust transactions.
- Workflow Automations: Manage automated workflows.
Accounts
Assign this role to users who require access to the trust and operating account and will record transactions. You can view the default and non-configurable permissions below.
What the Accounts role can do:
- Manage matter financials.
- View activities from assigned matters
- Accounts: View, create, edit, delete, export, and manage transactions and bank accounts.
- Matters: Manage billing preferences.
- Transactions: Export and manage trusts.
General Access
Assign this role to most legal professionals, such as lawyers and paralegals. This role provides a strong baseline for managing matters, tracking time, and working with clients.
What the General Access role can do:
-
Contacts management
- Edit, delete contacts, create contacts, and export contacts
-
Matter management
- Edit matter properties, Delete matters, Create matters, Export matters, View matter timeline
-
Timekeeping
- Views activities from assigned matters
- Conflict checks: Create, view, and manage conflict checks
Billing
Assign this role to a bookkeeper or accounting staff member who primarily manages firm finances, including bill payments and account transactions.
What the Billing role can do:
- View matter financials
- Views all activities
- Create, manage, and view bills and trust requests.
- Accounts: View bank accounts
- Activities: Bulk edit
- Matters: Manage billing preferences
- Payments: Manage plans, create charges, and view tax forms.
- Settings: Manage billing
- Transactions: View, edit, and manage.
Reports
Assign this role to managers who need to run firm-wide reports to analyze data without requiring access to other administrative settings.
What the Reports role can do:
- View activities from assigned matters.
- Dashboard: View firm dashboard
- Reports: View, create, and download reports, report presets, and report schedules.
When to use custom roles
Custom roles provide administrators precise control over user access to firm and client information. While Clio Manage’s system roles offer a solid foundation, custom roles enable tailored permission sets that meet your firm’s unique security, compliance, and workflow needs.
Note: This feature is available to firms with Essentials, Advanced, and Expand subscriptions. If you need to upgrade your firm’s plan, ask a firm administrator. Learn more about your plan's features.
You may want to create custom roles for your firm to:
- Define precise access and avoid over-privileging: Create a custom role to grant users access only to the data and functionalities they need. This directly addresses the need to avoid providing users with more access than their specific roles require, ensuring they have the correct tools for their tasks.
- Maintain compliance and protect client information: Custom roles help enforce ethical obligations and professional rules of conduct regarding client confidentiality. Control access to records (for example, Contacts and bills) and enable record filtering. You can limit who can view, edit, delete, or export sensitive information. This reduces risk and maintains data integrity.
- Streamline user management as your firm grows: For larger firms with many users, custom roles simplify the onboarding process. Instead of manually adjusting permissions for each new user, you can assign them a pre-configured role that matches their responsibilities.
Sample custom roles to get started
You can use standard roles as a baseline for managing your team. For more specific access, you can also create custom roles that are tailored to your firm’s unique needs. You can use a standard role as a template or build a new role from scratch. Here are some examples to help you get started:
Partner
This role provides them with all the access they need to carry out their practice and stay focused.
Key permissions:
- Edit and delete contacts
- Edit matter properties
- Create and delete matters
- View matter timeline
- View matter financials
- View firm feed
- View activities from assigned matters
Junior Paralegal
Create this role for a user who needs to perform daily tasks like managing matters and contacts while preventing them from taking sensitive administrative actions.
Key permissions:
- Create matter, edit matter properties, view matter timeline
- Create and edit contacts
- View Own activities
Billing Manager
This role offers access to financial data and reporting without providing full administrator permissions. The Billing system role is a great template for this.
Key permissions:
- Create and manage bills
- View all activities
- Perform bulk actions for transactions and accounts
- Export matters
Accountant
This role grants an Accountant limited, read-only access to firm contacts and billing information. The Accounts system role is a good starting point for this custom role.
Key permissions:
- View Own activities
- View matter financials
- View bills