How to complete your Flex Legal timesheet

Every Tuesday, Flex sends automated timesheets to all of our paralegals and lawyers who are active on a placement. This allows you to keep a record of the hours you spent working each day on any given week. The invoice we send to our clients will be based on the hours recorded on these timesheets, so it’s super important that your timesheets are filled out accurately so you will get paid on time.

Here’s a handy step-by-step guide on how to fill out your Flex timesheet each week; and make sure to check out our Payroll FAQ’s for any further questions!

1) Get your timesheet

2) Record your hours

• You can fill out the timesheet on your last working day of that week. Before you do this, just make sure you won’t be working another day that week to prevent having your timesheet being voided and going through the hassle of having to fill it out again.
• If you’d prefer to do so, you can input your hours daily! If you open your timesheet on one device, you can input your weekly hours everyday and all your previously recorded times will be sat there. Just make sure that you’re using the same device to log your hours everyday!

Once you’ve received your timesheet, you can start by filling in the hours you worked the day(s) before.

Here are some really important points to note when filling out your timesheet:

• If you are a lawyer working on a daily rate, please ensure that you’re familiar with our day rate breakdown: Up to 2.5hrs = 0.25 day, 2.5-5.5hrs = 0.5 day, and 5.5+ hours = full day.
• Time should be recorded in a 24hr format (e.g. a start time of 9am should be inputted as 09:00 and an end time of 5pm should be inputted as 17:00).
• Be sure to input all your breaks (e.g. lunch breaks, pre-agreed appointments etc).
• If you are on a project where you are also required to input your working hours on the client’s time-keeping software, it is vital that the time recorded on both timesheets are the exact same. We invoice clients based on the hours you submit and any discrepancies will be flagged by the client, which may cause a delay in the payroll process and therefore you may be paid late.
• Be sure to only submit your timesheet AFTER your last shift of the week. If for example, you submit your timesheet on Tuesday, and work again on Thursday that week, your previously submitted timesheet will need to be voided and a new timesheet will need to be filled out. Please note that any errors made on your timesheet should be flagged to us ASAP to prevent any issues in the payroll process.
• You must not work beyond the hours set out in your Assignment Confirmation without prior client approval.
• Your timesheet will run from Monday to Sunday each week.
• Days not worked should be unticked.
• Please email us ASAP if you have submitted any errors as you’ll need to send a new timesheet through.

3) Submit your timesheet

Failure to log your hours correctly may result in our client querying your recorded hours, causing a delay in us paying you (which we definitely don’t want). After you submit your hours, you will receive the pictured email to say that your timesheet has been submitted.

You can also view the times you submitted for that given week, meaning you can double-check that everything is correct.

If you have any doubt about the hours you submitted or want to check that your timesheet has been submitted, get in touch with us.

4) Wait for payday

Tip: The password to access your payslip is the postcode (including spaces) listed on your Flex online profile!

You can also see previously submitted timesheets by logging into your profile and clicking on the ‘Employment’ tab followed by the ‘Timesheets’ tab.

This feature is useful as it allows you to refer to previous timesheets, and check that you are being paid for the number of hours you have worked and recorded.

Please note: We trust our candidates to fill in their timesheet accurately. If we find out that we have underpaid/overpaid you incorrectly based on a timesheet you have submitted, we will ensure your next payslip accurately reflects the hours you should have been paid (which may mean increased or reduced pay). Please do ensure that we avoid this scenario as it inconveniences the client, whilst also delaying and impacting your pay.

We hope this step-by-step guide has been useful, but please check out our Payroll FAQ’s or get in touch with us if you have any further questions at all - we’re always happy to help!

Additional Resources:

• 10 tips for time-recording and legal timesheets - working in law means you'll be filling out a lot of timesheets. There's a definite art to doing this, so read our 10 timesheet tips now!
• Ways of working guide - check out our ways of working page for more professional tips for your placements with Flex Legal.
• Payroll FAQs - still have some questions which haven’t been answered in this blog? Check out our handy selection of payroll FAQs here.