Firm Capacity Calculator

Capacity planning in a law firm usually starts from an annual target and works down. Starting from the daily reality and working up produces a more honest number, because the daily figure is the one that has to be sustained for forty-odd weeks.

This calculator takes the hours a fee earner genuinely records in a day and builds up to annual capacity and collected revenue, so the target reflects a real year rather than an arithmetic one.

Result

Annual capacity

1,350

Cash produced

$361,793

Monthly hours: 112.5
Weekly hours: 30
Value recorded: $418,500
Value invoiced: $380,835
Lost to write-downs and non-payment: $56,707
Effective rate: $268.00
Overall yield: 86.45%

This tool performs arithmetic on the values you enter. It does not provide legal advice and does not create an attorney-client relationship.

Recorded time is not revenue. Write-downs before invoicing (realization) and unpaid invoices (collection) both reduce it, and the effective rate is what remains per hour recorded.

A one point improvement in collection is usually easier to win than a rate increase of the same value.

From recorded time to cash

Stage	Value	Share of recorded
Time recorded	$418,500	100%
Invoiced after write-downs	$380,835	91%
Cash collected	$361,793	86.45%

How to use the firm capacity calculator

Enter the billable hours a typical fee earner records in a day.
Enter days per week and working weeks per year, excluding leave.
Enter the average rate across the team.
Apply realization and collection to see the cash that capacity produces.

What people use this for

Setting a per-fee-earner capacity assumption for planning.
Modelling whether a hire is needed or whether capacity exists.
Testing what happens to revenue when targets are pushed too hard.
Building a firm revenue forecast from the bottom up.

Worked examples

Every figure below is produced by running this calculator against the example inputs, so the numbers always match the tool.

A sustainable pattern

6 hours a day, 5 days, 45 weeks at $310, with 91% realization and 95% collection.

Annual capacity: 1,350
Cash produced: $361,793
Effective rate: $268.00

A stretched pattern

Eight hours a day at the same rate, with realization falling to 84% under the pressure.

Annual capacity: 1,800
Cash produced: $445,284
Lost to write-downs and non-payment: $112,716

Weeks per year is where plans go wrong

Fifty-two weeks is never available. Holiday, public holidays, sick leave, training, and the partially productive weeks around all of them typically remove six or seven.

Planning at forty-five weeks rather than fifty-two changes annual capacity by more than thirteen percent, which on a firm-wide forecast is the difference between a plan and a wish.

Pushing daily hours has a cost

The second example is the point of this calculator. Raising the daily target from six hours to eight looks like a thirty-three percent increase in capacity, and it usually is not - because time recorded under pressure is written down more often.

Modelling the realization drop alongside the hours increase gives a much more honest picture of what a stretched target actually delivers, and occasionally shows that it delivers less.

Methodology and assumptions

What this calculator does, and what it deliberately does not do.

Annual hours = hours per day × days per week × weeks per year.
Recorded value = hours × rate; realization and collection are then applied in sequence.
The effective rate divides collected value by hours recorded.
The tool performs arithmetic or date counting on the values you enter. It does not interpret a rule, a statute or a contract.
Nothing you type is transmitted or stored - the calculation runs entirely inside your browser.

This website provides general informational and productivity tools and does not provide legal advice or create an attorney-client relationship.

The date and deadline tools count days exactly as you instruct them. They do not interpret court rules, statutes of limitation, filing requirements or any other legal authority, and they do not know the rules of your jurisdiction.

Always verify any date, fee, or calculation against the governing rule, the court calendar and your own professional judgement. If you need legal advice, consult a lawyer licensed in your jurisdiction.

Frequently asked questions

Should this be per fee earner or firm-wide?

Either. Use per-earner figures for capacity planning and multiply by headcount, or enter firm-wide averages directly.

What daily figure is realistic?

Whatever your time records actually show over a full month, not what a target says. The two are frequently quite different.

Does a higher target always increase revenue?

Not necessarily. If realization falls as targets rise, collected revenue can flatten or decline. Model both together.

How is this different from the firm profit calculator?

This builds capacity from a daily habit. The profit calculator starts from total capacity and subtracts costs to reach profit.

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