What about the special needs of the major clients of the firm, such as bills with breakdown formats or e-billing. Consider these factors when assessing a billing system. Some packages have customized fields in some tables, and many have report writers available, such as Crystal Reports. Even better, many systems can now output their data directly to a format that is compatible with Microsoft Excel and other spreadsheet programs. In many firms, the difference in the way the software handles accounting is even more important than the way the system handles billing.
Most packages just fail to do it in a user-friendly way or the way the firm needs.
Some only offer time and billing, while others integrate on different levels. Same vendor, different program, the same software house and interface, but data gets exported from one separately-functioning module into the other. In TABS, for example, the use-interface is now seamless, but the system doesn't automatically apply fees and costs that are paid by the same check to different General Ledger accounts. The user must enter two different payment transactions, one for fees and one for expenses and advances. An example would be Timeslips integration with One-Write Plus or QuickBooks.