Outlaw Practice handles paid consults, which involve taking a payment and generating an invoice before the client has signed a retention agreement.

The first step is to turn on paid consults in the Options section. Navigate to Options/General.

In the Initial Consults section, we need to click on "Our firm charges for initial consultations", then set the cost and time fields. We also need to give a name for our initial consultation, for example "Case Strategy Meeting", to help the client understand that this is more than just a quick meeting to see if you and they are a good fit. Finally, we assign an activity type to the meeting. You can use a standard one or create a custom one in Activity Types.

For example, if you charge $350 for a 2-hour consult, and you call them Case Strategy Meetings, you would enter the fields as follows:

Once you turn on paid initial consults, all new Case Types that you define will default to having paid consults. If you have already defined Case Types, you will need to go and turn on paid consults for them. Start by navigating to Options/Case Types.

In each Case Type, click on the Paid Consult? button and save the Case Type.

Use the normal sales process to work through the sales milestones. When you get to the Appointment Made milestone, the Paid Consult becomes available.

When you get to the Appointment Scheduled milestone for the Lead, you should enter a date in the Initial Consult Date field. Once that date is entered, the Paid Consult option is shown. Outlaw Practice will automatically check the button if the Case Type uses paid consults.

At this point, you should make a Task for the Initial Consult. A button will be shown in the Lead to make this painless. Click on the Add Task for Consult button:

This will open a new Task with all of the fields filled in for you. You can modify the entry, or just click on the OK button.

You can take a payment as soon as the initial consult has been scheduled. It is best practice to create the Task first, but you can create it beforehand if it is easier.

Just click on the Take Payment button.

This will create a new Transaction with all of the fields filled in for you. Fill in the Payer and Payment Method fields and add notes as needed, then click on the OK button.

You will see the Lead update with the following status information:

When the time comes for the initial consult, start the timer on the task.

Have the consult, then stop the timer and mark the Task as Completed.

You are now ready to generate an invoice for the client. You will now see a button to Generate the Invoice.

Click on the button to generate the invoice. If it looks good you can Finalize the invoice.

You can then print and save the invoice as you would with a normal invoice.

Note that Download downloads the document to your Downloads folder, whereas Save to Documents saves the invoice to your Notes and Documents area for this Lead.