Trust and retainer replenishment console for law firms

I want an internal console my firm administrator opens and works from, not a scheduled report. It answers one question in a single screen: which client matters are running low on the money we hold in trust or on retainer, so we can ask for a top up before we do any more work on them. The administrator should be able to work the list down and clear it, the way you work an inbox.

The main tab is a watchlist table, one row per active matter. Build it from Clio List Matters for the matter, client, practice area, and responsible attorney; Clio List Trust Line Items for the money held against each matter or client; Clio List Bank Accounts so you only count balances sitting in trust or retainer accounts and never mix in the firm's operating account; and Clio List Activities for open work in progress that has not been billed yet. Each row shows the client and matter, the current trust balance, the value of unbilled work that will draw that balance down, the projected balance once that work is billed, the firm's replenishment floor for that matter, and the shortfall against the floor.

Two calculation details matter. Clio reports time entry quantity in seconds, so convert to hours and multiply by the entry's rate to value the work in progress, and use the entry's own total amount when it already carries one. Only count activities that have not been billed, and include unbilled expense entries as well as time. Index endpoints are cursor paginated with page_token, so page all the way through rather than showing a partial first page, and show the administrator when the data was last refreshed with a button to refresh it.

The replenishment floor is configurable per practice area. Read the list of practice areas from Clio List Practice Areas and let the administrator set a minimum balance for each one in a settings view, with a firm wide default for anything not set. Store these floors in the app so they persist between sessions and everyone at the firm sees the same numbers.

Sort the biggest shortfalls to the top by default. Wherever a projected balance goes negative, show a prominent warning treatment on the row and a count of those rows at the top of the page. An overdrawn trust account is an ethics and compliance problem rather than just a billing inconvenience, so those rows should be impossible to scroll past. Let the administrator filter by practice area and by responsible attorney, and search by client or matter name.

The administrator selects one or more rows and clicks a request replenishment button. Pull the client contact email addresses with Clio List Contacts, then open a review step showing one draft message per client, with a suggested top up amount that brings the balance back above the floor with the upcoming work covered. The administrator can edit the amount, the subject, and the body before anything sends, and can drop individual recipients. Sending goes out through Gmail Send a Message, one personalized message per client contact rather than a single group email. If a client has no email address on file, show that clearly instead of failing silently.

After each message sends, log a follow up in Clio with Create Task against the matter so nothing gets forgotten, due a configurable number of days out and assigned to the responsible attorney, with the requested amount in the task description. Record the request in the app too, so the row shows that a top up was requested, when, for how much, and by whom. Rows that have been requested move into a requested state and stop cluttering the main list, and the administrator can snooze a row or mark it cleared manually once funds arrive.

A second tab shows overdue invoices for these same clients as context, built from Clio List Outstanding Client Balances and Clio List Bills, with the client, invoice number, amount outstanding, due date, and days overdue. This tab is read only. It is there so the administrator can see that a client who is low on trust is also sitting on unpaid bills before deciding how to word the request. The trust and replenishment view stays the primary one.

Keep the wording plain in the interface and in the client emails. Trust accounting terminology varies by country, so say money held in trust or on retainer rather than assuming one jurisdiction's label, and keep the outgoing email courteous and short.