Clio's 2025 benchmarks, drawn from its own users, describe a familiar day: utilisation of 38%, which means about 3.0 billable hours captured in eight. Realisation of 88% turns that into 2.6 hours invoiced, and collection of 93% into 2.4 hours collected. Median lockup, the time from work done to cash received, was 93 days.
The rest of the day is not idle. It is intake, chasing documents, drafting from templates, reminders and billing. That is where automation earns its keep, and it is the same in New York, London, Dubai or Mumbai.
1. Intake and conflict checks
Every enquiry needs the same first steps: capture the parties, run the conflicts check, decide whether to take the matter, then collect the detail. Automating the first half means a new enquiry is acknowledged in minutes, the conflicts search runs automatically against your client database, and the narrative is only requested once the check clears. We set out the two-stage form in detail in our intake template article.
2. Document assembly
Engagement letters, standard agreements, letters before action, routine applications: most firms rebuild these from the last similar file. Document assembly fills a vetted template from the matter data you already hold, so a fee earner reviews instead of retyping.
Example (illustrative). A five-lawyer employment practice turns a settlement agreement request into a draft in minutes: the client's details, the employer, the payment terms and the standard clauses are pulled from the matter, and the lawyer reviews the bespoke parts.
3. Engagement letters and e-signatures
The engagement letter goes out automatically when a matter is opened, is signed electronically, and the signed copy lands on the file. Electronic signatures are recognised for most contracts under the US ESIGN Act, the EU eIDAS regulation, the UK Electronic Communications Act, UAE Federal Decree-Law No. 46 of 2021 and India's IT Act 2000. Exclusions differ: wills commonly cannot be e-signed, India excludes property conveyance and powers of attorney, and UK deeds need a physically present witness.
4. Deadlines and tasks
Limitation dates, court deadlines and internal review dates calculated from the matter and pushed to calendars, with escalation if a task is not marked done. Missed deadlines are among the most preventable causes of claims against lawyers.
5. Time capture and billing
Prompts to record time from calendar events and documents worked on, draft invoices generated at the end of the month, and payment reminders that stop as soon as an invoice is paid. Each day an invoice is not sent adds to lockup.
Where AI fits, and the rules
Adoption is uneven. The ABA's 2024 AI TechReport found 30.2% of attorneys said their office used AI tools, from 47.8% at firms of 500+ lawyers to 17.7% of solos. Accuracy was the top concern (74.7%).
- United States: the ABA's Formal Opinion 512 (2024) sets out duties of competence, confidentiality and reasonable fees when using generative AI.
- United Kingdom: the SRA says firms remain fully accountable for AI output. The Law Society's guidance warns against putting confidential data into tools you do not control and requires every citation to be checked. In May 2025 the SRA authorised its first AI-driven firm, Garfield.Law, with conditions including a ban on the system proposing case law.
- European Union and others: professional secrecy and GDPR apply to client data wherever it is processed. Keep client data in tools covered by a processing agreement.
In practice this means using AI to draft and summarise inside systems you control, with a lawyer reviewing before anything leaves the firm.
What not to automate
- Advice and judgement. Automation prepares; a lawyer decides.
- Anything filed or sent to a court without review.
- Client data in general-purpose AI tools without the right agreements and consent.
Connecting to your practice software
- Clio: API v4 with OAuth 2.0 and signed webhooks, in US, EU, Canada and Australia data regions.
- MyCase: an open API on its Advanced tier.
- Smokeball: an OAuth API in the US, Australia and UK through its partner programme.
- Actionstep: an OAuth REST API with regional endpoints.
If your system has no usable API, document assembly and intake can still run alongside it, with a person filing the output.
How we approach it
We pick one high-volume matter type, map it from first enquiry to final invoice, and automate the steps that repeat. Then we measure lockup and non-billable time before and after.
Sources: Clio Legal Trends benchmarks (2025, vendor); Thomson Reuters State of U.S. Small Law Firms (2023, via legal.io); ABA 2024 AI TechReport; ABA Formal Opinion 512; SRA risk outlook on AI (November 2023); Legal Cheek on Garfield.Law (May 2025); Law Society generative AI guidance (September 2025); 15 U.S.C. 7001; eIDAS Regulation 910/2014; Al Tamimi on UAE Decree-Law 46/2021; India IT Act 2000; Clio, MyCase, Smokeball and Actionstep developer documentation. Checked 6 October 2026.