Case Task Checklist

A conflicts check that was performed but never recorded is, for practical purposes, a conflicts check that was never performed. An engagement letter that was drafted but never signed leaves the fee arrangement unenforceable and the scope undefined.

These items take minutes at the start of a matter and are difficult or impossible to remedy later. That is why they are first, and why they are worth completing before substantive work begins rather than alongside it.

The item that says deadlines should be independently verified is there deliberately. A deadline calculated once by one person, using one reading of one rule, is a single point of failure with consequences that are frequently uninsurable in practical terms.

Whatever docketing system a practice uses, a second person checking the calculation against the rule is the control that catches the error that matters.

Matters that are finished but never formally closed accumulate. The client does not know the retainer balance is theirs, originals sit in a file room, and the retention clock never starts.

A closing letter is a small piece of administration that ends the relationship cleanly and starts every clock that needs starting. The post-matter review in the same section is what turns one matter into an estimate for the next.