Accounts receivable automation case study: law firm billing on a schedule, with payments synced to each client account

The challenge: bringing a law firm's finances and casework together

Law firms ran the financial side of their work apart from the operational side. The aim was one platform for both, covering client billing, payments, financing and casework, supporting more predictable cash flow, and giving staff fewer routine account updates. The platform needed to address four requirements:

• One model for the money. Upfront financing, payment reconciliation, billing cycles that run on their own and client transactions kept in sync all had to fit a single financial model.
• Payment details kept safe. Each client's payment methods and details had to be stored and processed securely.
• Every change, live. Each payment, financing step and case action had to show up in real time, for the right case and attorney.
• Scale. The platform had to stay fast for growing firms and heavy transaction volumes.

What we built: accounts receivable automation on Django, Celery and Stripe

We built the financial model, the background jobs, the payment and financing links, and the live updates. Six pieces carry it:

• The financial logic. Django structures the workflows and the core financial logic: financing, billing cycles and reconciliation.
• Billing and syncing in the background. Celery runs the automated billing and keeps payments in sync, work that would otherwise mean updating transactions and client accounts by hand.
• Financing and payouts. Stripe handles advance financing and payouts, an option attorneys can take, meant to keep cash flow predictable.
• More ways to pay. Clients get several payment methods and automated subscriptions.
• Live updates. WebSockets push real-time notifications and updates on payments, financing and case actions, and role-based access decides who sees what.
• Room to grow. AWS keeps the platform fast for firms of any size, under heavy transaction volumes and traffic.

Where the automation stops, and who takes over

There's no AI model in this one: the platform runs the billing, the syncing and the updates, and the decisions about money stay with the firm.

This is the split our back office automation starts from: routine posting and syncing go to code, and people keep the decisions. A model is worth adding only where a step needs reading or judgement, and none went into this platform.

Results

Firms handle their finances and casework in one place, with live updates for clients and staff. Routine payment updates no longer need to be entered into client accounts one by one. The table describes what changed; no percentage improvement was recorded for these measures.

Technologies and tools

Timeline

The build took one year.

If your team still updates client accounts by hand after each payment, our back office automation counts that process step by step first, then gives its routine part to tested code with a log a controller can follow. When clients keep asking about their charges, our Stripe integration services connect an AI agent that explains charges and recovers failed payments, on a restricted key and within limits you set.