Command every hour, from worked to collected.
LeanLaw runs the full hourly lifecycle — time capture, billing, payments, and the reporting that reads them — as one connected system on QuickBooks Online. Realization, collection, and days-to-collect stay live by matter and by timekeeper, so you're acting on this month's performance instead of reconstructing last month's.
LeanLaw is built on QuickBooks Online — the financial source of truth the platform runs on, not a system it syncs to.
Firm Performance Overview
LiveRealization
92.4%
↑ +1.8% vs. last mo.
Collection Rate
98.1%
↑ +0.9% vs. last mo.
Days-to-Collect
22d
–3d vs. last mo.
Worked → Billed → Collected · Rolling 6 months
$284k
WIP
$97k
In Draft
$41k
Aging AR
$612k
Collected MTD
Hourly firms rarely lose revenue in a single visible event. They lose it in the handoffs. Time gets reconstructed on Friday afternoon, and the hours nobody remembers never become entries. Entries that were captured get written down in billing-week chaos and never reach an invoice. Invoices age quietly in AR until someone writes them off. By the time the numbers surface at month-end, every decision that could have changed them has already been made.
Three rates decide how much of the work your attorneys do becomes money in the bank, and they multiply: utilization × realization × collection. The industry average — 38% × 88% × 93% — leaves just 31% of potential revenue collected. Most firms can quote those averages. Almost none can say, in real time, where their own firm sits — or which rate is costing them most this month.
The market sold hourly firms billing software that reports the leak after it happens. LeanLaw was built to close it while it's still open.
Where revenue leaks — three rates, one multiplier
Utilization
38 %
Hours tracked vs. available
Realization
88 %
Tracked time that gets billed
Collection
93 %
Billed amounts that get paid
LeanLaw lifts every rate — utilization toward 48%+, realization toward 90%+, collection toward 99%+ — turning 31% captured into 43%+, and recovering up to $61K per attorney a year. For a 10-attorney firm, that's typically a 20–50× return on the software.
Watch LeanLaw run the hourly lifecycle.
A short walkthrough of capture, billing, payments, and the live reporting that reads them — all on one QuickBooks Online ledger.
From worked to collected — one system, four stages.
Every hour moves through the same path — captured, billed, collected, and read. LeanLaw owns all four on one QuickBooks Online ledger, so each stage feeds the next without a manual handoff.
Stage 1 — Capture
Capture the hour when it happens, not on Friday.
Time reconstructed at the end of the week is time the firm never fully recovers. LeanLaw captures billable work in the moment, the way each timekeeper works: manual entry and timers, calendar events converted to entries, mobile capture in court, and AI that surfaces invisible work — email, research, document review — before the detail goes cold.
What it moves
Utilization — more of the work that gets done becomes billable in the first place.
Stage 2 — Bill
Turn billing week into billing day.
The longer billable work sits between done and invoiced, the more of it leaks. LeanLaw's Draft Editor and the Ready-to-Bill → Draft → Approve pipeline let a billing administrator review, edit, apply bulk write-downs and holds, and send LEDES-formatted invoices in a single structured pass — instead of chasing attorneys for a week every month.
What it moves
Realization — more captured time reaches a clean invoice, faster.
Stage 3 — Collect
Put the payment where the invoice already is.
Full-balance payment links and Pay-Now buttons live inside the invoice itself, with card and ACH acceptance and pay-from-trust for retainer work. Evergreen retainers replenish trust automatically, so the next matter starts funded. Every payment reconciles to QuickBooks Online the moment it lands.
What it moves
Collection rate and days-to-collect — invoices you already sent become deposits in days, not months.
Stage 4 — Read
See WIP → Billed → Collected before month-end closes it.
LeanLaw's performance dashboards show the full dollar lifecycle in real time — unbilled WIP, what's in draft, what's aging in AR, and what's actually collected — with realization, collection rate, and days-to-collect broken out by matter and by timekeeper. When a collections month starts slow, you see it in week one.
What it moves
Live visibility — the number you need is current at every step, not reconstructed at month-end.
Stop reconstructing last month. Start reading this one.
Realization, collection rate, and days-to-collect, by responsible attorney and by timekeeper, drawn live from the same QuickBooks Online ledger your books already run on. The benchmark is public: the average firm realizes 88% of what it bills and collects 93% of what it invoices — and LeanLaw's top firms run materially higher. The dashboard tells you where your firm sits against that line, and which number to move first.
| Timekeeper | Utilization | Realization | Collection | Days-to-Collect |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| M. Harrison, Partner | 7.4 hrs/day | 94.2% | 99.1% | 18d |
| J. Reyes, Partner | 6.8 hrs/day | 91.5% | 97.8% | 24d |
| T. Kim, Associate | 5.1 hrs/day | 84.3% | 95.2% | 38d |
| S. Patel, Associate | 6.2 hrs/day | 89.8% | 96.4% | 21d |
Built for every seat that touches the money.
Managing Partner / COO
Revenue clarity without the month-end reconstruction.
You see realization, collection, and days-to-collect by timekeeper and by matter in real time — and partner comp built on numbers the whole table can verify. Switching is a billing-workflow change, not an accounting migration: your QuickBooks Online data stays where it is.
Firm Administrator / Billing Lead
Billing week becomes billing day.
WIP, drafts, and aging are visible before the partner asks. Bulk write-downs, holds, and LEDES formatting happen in one structured pass. The questions you used to field one invoice at a time, the data answers up front.
Timekeeper / Associate
Log time the way you work. Nothing else is your job.
Log time the way you work — timer, calendar, mobile, or AI-surfaced — and get back to the matter. Capture takes seconds. Holding the rest of the lifecycle together isn’t your job.
Other platforms sync to QuickBooks Online. LeanLaw runs inside it.
Most legal billing platforms can show you what you billed. Almost none can show you what you actually earned and what became of it — because they sit beside your accounting system and push data across, instead of reading from the ledger itself.
| Capability | LeanLaw | Clio | Smokeball | MyCase |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Runs inside QuickBooks Online (not syncs) | ✓ | ✕ | ✕ | ✕ |
| Live realization & collection rate dashboard | ✓ | ~ | ✕ | ✕ |
| By-timekeeper performance metrics, live | ✓ | ~ | ✕ | ✕ |
| Full billing-approval workflow (Draft Editor) | ✓ | ~ | ~ | ~ |
| Payments reconcile directly to QBO ledger | ✓ | ✕ | ✕ | ✕ |
| Line-item integrity in books (not summary) | ✓ | ✕ | ✕ | ✕ |
Further reading
More on realization, collections, and turning billable hours into collected revenue.
- Article Why Hourly-Billing Firms Collect Less Than They've Earned — And What Fixes It Read →
- Article Accounts Receivable Aging for Law Firms: What the Numbers Are Telling You Read →
- Article Realization Rate Analysis: Value-Based vs. Hourly Matters Read →
- Article Structuring Associate Bonus Plans: Collected Revenue vs. Billable Hours Read →
Frequently asked questions
What is realization rate, and why does it matter?
Realization rate is the share of worked time that reaches a clean invoice. LeanLaw shows realization, collection rate, and days-to-collect live, by matter and timekeeper, so you can act before month-end instead of reconstructing the gap after.
How does LeanLaw improve collections for hourly firms?
By connecting time capture, billing, and payments on one QuickBooks Online ledger — full-balance payment links inside invoices, automatic reconciliation, and live AR aging — so invoices become deposits in days, not months.
Does LeanLaw track performance by timekeeper?
Yes. Utilization, realization, collection rate, and days-to-collect are broken out by responsible attorney and timekeeper, drawn live from the QuickBooks Online ledger.
The revenue is already earned. See what happens to it.
If your firm finds out its realization gap at month-end — or rebuilds it in a spreadsheet when a partner asks — a demo is 20 minutes that shows you where the gap actually lives, in your own numbers. LeanLaw requires QuickBooks Online; if you're on it, setup is a structured workflow change with migration support included.
Join 1,000+ law firms that lifted their utilization, realization, and collection rates.