Well, it is a bit more nuanced than that, but I understand what you need.

You may not necessarily need a whole new database, just stop billing any clients that leave your firm past February 10th and you will not have any new A/R in your database for those clients, but will continue to show prior balances as due.

IF they just insist on a new database, that's fine, but you need to bring TWO things over from the old database. Previous balances for A/R and Funds AND any unbilled slips.

You would use the new database based on current to create a new database with all of the names from the old database, but no balances and slips. Then you would purge out any clients that are leaving the firm to go with the departed partner, leaving you with only YOUR clients in the new database. Then you need to add in their starting A/R balances (read the help file re: Invoice A/R transactions) and bring forward any unbilled slips via an archive/combine (you do not have to rekey these slips).

Hope that helps.

Thank you, Nancy. I'm still not clear, though. We don't want to bill any new time after February 10 to the old database because our firm name and ownership changed and it is for the old firm. We'll keep billing clients with only previous balances and no new time (even those that left) out of that database, and any payments will be credited to the old firm.

Then, for our new firm name as of February 11, we'll bill the clients who stayed with us out of the new database, and any payments for work after that date will be credited to the new firm. This is why we need to have the A/R for the new firm NOT reflect any past balances that will be paid to the old firm.

So, to keep the A/R for the old firm and new firm separate, it seems like I need a third database so I can bill previous balances from the old firm for the remaining clients who have new time as well. Is this correct? If so, I'm still not sure how to import A/R balances and funds transactions (there are no unbilled slips).

Thanks so much!

If I understand you have two options:
1. Keep the current database and then make a second database that is a complete copy. Change the firm name. Next I would close and purge all clients that you are not keeping. This will allow you to see history on these matters.
2. Keep the current database and make a new database based on the existing. You can choose the clients you want and the expenses, timekeepers and activities. Then you would need to manually enter trust balances and AR balances in this database. History would stay in the old database.

Not quite. You should only need 2 databases.

Database 1 = Old Firm (OF) database, contains A/R as of February 10th and no remaining WIP. All billed out as of February 10th. At this point all you need to do is track the receipts to pay off those balances, and bill out reminders of previous balances that they still owe. (Assuming this income gets split some sort of way among OF partners.)

Database 2 = new database based on current for New Firm (NF). NO previous balances, and no WIP. I would go through and remove the names of clients that are not coming to the new firm just to clean things up, then just enter time and bill out of the Database 2 as you normally did.

****Clients being retained by your new firm will potentially get TWO bills with TWO balances. One from OF that reflects what is owed to the OF.  The balance of which only goes down as they pay it until they reach zero.  And one from NF that increases with new billings, and goes down as paid (normal behavior).

There is no reason to have a third database, and will only confuse you and your clients if you combine balances/charges from OF with NF.

My biggest question is this:  is the income from Old Firm for 1/1/2017-2/10/2017 going to belong entirely to New Firm?  Because if so, you really don't need to do anything at all and just keep going in the original database.  But if there is some sort of way that the 1/1/2017-2/10/2017 receipts will be handled differently - ex.: split amongst different partners, then you need to create the new database based on current to separate the income.

Hope that helps.

Hi Nancy,

Yes, income for work up until February 10 will be split between the partners of the old firm, so that database needs to be kept separately.

For Database 2, the problem is that they want previous balances from the old firm (for clients continuing with the new firm) to show up on the new firm's invoices, but also want to keep track of A/R from just the new firm. The only thing I knew to do is have Database 2 for just the new firm, and Database 3 based on Database 2, with previous balances brought over from Database 1.

Sending 2 invoices as you suggested would eliminate the need for the third database, but they don't want to do that. Am I on the right track with my solution?

Thanks so much!

No, just no. Tell them I said no.

The previous balances from Database 1 do not belong to the new firm and should not appear as A/R balances in Database 2. Trying to have a third database is just a nightmare. They will spend vastly more money tracking all of this than just cutting the cord and keeping two balances for a while.

Thank you, Nancy. I agree, but unfortunately I haven't been able to convince them. It may be that I just keep two databases and track what they want separately in an Excel spreadsheet. As long as they have the data they want, I believe this will work.

Thanks again!