Pre-Bill Review Against Billing Guidelines
Before a firm releases an invoice to a client with billing guidelines, or when in-house counsel receives an outside counsel invoice and needs a first-pass compliance check.
Outside counsel guidelines are long, detailed and easy to violate by accident. A timekeeper who was never approved, a narrative that bundles three tasks, a second attorney at a call the client only pays for one person to attend: each is a small write-down, and together they erode realization and client trust. On the other side, in-house teams receive stacks of invoices and rarely have time to check each line against the guidelines they negotiated.
This prompt compares a pasted invoice against the pasted guidelines entry by entry. It checks block billing, vague narratives, non-billable tasks, staffing and attendee limits, rate caps, billing increments, travel and expense rules and pre-approval requirements. Every issue quotes both the invoice entry and the guideline section it relies on, carries a suggested action and a confidence label, and the output closes with dollar totals by category and any guideline language that is ambiguous or could not be applied.
Claude applies only the guidelines and approvals you paste, so an approved exception it has not seen will look like a violation, and an unwritten client expectation will not be flagged at all. It does not decide whether to write time off, and its totals should be checked before you rely on them. The billing attorney or reviewing in-house lawyer makes every final call, and the output is a draft for attorney review.
The Prompt
Review a draft legal invoice against the client's outside counsel billing guidelines. I am [THE BILLING ATTORNEY AT THE FIRM / IN-HOUSE COUNSEL REVIEWING A RECEIVED INVOICE]. Matter: [MATTER NAME]. <document name="billing_guidelines"> [PASTE THE OUTSIDE COUNSEL GUIDELINES OR THE BILLING SECTIONS] </document> <document name="invoice"> [PASTE THE DRAFT OR RECEIVED INVOICE: DATE, TIMEKEEPER, ROLE, RATE, HOURS, NARRATIVE, EXPENSES] </document> Other approved terms (rate letters, staffing approvals, budget): [PASTE OR "NONE"] Check every time entry and expense against the guidelines. Look for: block billing; vague narratives; tasks the guidelines make non-billable; staffing limits (number of attendees, timekeeper levels, unapproved timekeepers); rates above approved rates or caps; minimum billing increments; daily hour limits; travel time and travel expense rules; expense items that are excluded, capped or need receipts; and anything requiring pre-approval. Output: 1. Issues table: # | Entry (date, timekeeper, hours or amount) | Quoted entry text | Guideline quoted with section | Issue | Suggested action (revise narrative, reduce, write off, get approval, attach receipt) | Confidence (clear violation / judgment call). 2. Totals: hours and dollars at issue by category. 3. Guideline provisions you could not apply because the invoice lacks information (for example, timekeeper role missing). 4. Ambiguous guideline language worth clarifying with the [CLIENT / FIRM]. Quote both the entry and the guideline for every issue. Do not flag anything you cannot tie to specific guideline language; list general concerns separately. Do not calculate reductions the guidelines do not specify. This is a draft for attorney review; final billing decisions are mine.
Example Output
An issues table that quotes each problem entry next to the guideline it violates with a suggested action, plus dollar totals by issue type and a list of guideline gaps and ambiguities.
Illustrative example — names, figures, and facts are fictional.
PRE-BILL GUIDELINES REVIEW (DRAFT FOR ATTORNEY REVIEW) Client: Ostrander Health Systems | Matter: Vendor contract dispute | Invoice period: [MONTH] 1. ISSUES # | Entry | Quoted entry | Guideline | Issue | Action | Confidence 1 | [DATE], R. Halvorsen, 3.8 | "Research, draft motion, emails with client" | Sec. 4.2: "Each task must be separately itemized with time allocated." | Block billing | Split with time per task | Clear violation 2 | [DATE], T. Whitcombe (associate), 1.0 | "Attend client call" | Sec. 5.1: "Only one attorney may bill for internal or client calls absent prior approval." | Second attendee (R. Halvorsen also billed 1.0) | Write off one entry or document approval | Clear violation 3 | [DATE], L. Ferrante, 0.6 | "Organize file" | Sec. 6.3: "Clerical tasks, including file organization, are not billable." | Non-billable task | Write off | Clear violation 4 | [DATE], R. Halvorsen, rate $640 | n/a | Rate letter: "$595 for 2026" | Rate above approved rate | Bill at $595 | Clear violation 5 | [DATE], timekeeper not listed, travel 4.0 hrs | "Travel to deposition" | Sec. 8.1: "Travel time billed at 50% of standard rate." | Billed at full rate | Reduce to 50% rate | Clear violation 6 | [DATE], expense $212 | "Working dinner" | Sec. 9.4: "Meals are reimbursable only when travel is overnight." | No lodging or overnight stay appears on the invoice | Confirm travel was overnight or remove expense | Judgment call 2. TOTALS AT ISSUE Block billing: 3.8 hrs (requires revision, not reduction) Staffing: 1.0 hr / $410 Non-billable: 0.6 hr / $114 Rate: $45 x 6.2 hrs = $279 Travel: 4.0 hrs (dollar amount not calculated; see section 3) Expenses: $212 3. COULD NOT APPLY - Sec. 5.3 limits paralegal hours to "approved personnel." No approved list was provided. - Sec. 8.1 travel reduction: entry 5 lists no timekeeper or rate, so the 50% reduction cannot be priced. 4. AMBIGUOUS LANGUAGE - Sec. 6.3 does not say whether e-filing is clerical. Clarify with the client.
Tips
- •Paste the full billing section of the guidelines, not a summary. Many issues turn on exact wording such as what counts as "administrative" or which attendees need approval.
- •Include rate letters and staffing approvals in the other approved terms field. Otherwise Claude will flag approved exceptions as violations.
- •Use the confidence column to sort your work: fix clear violations before billing, and decide judgment calls with the relationship partner or the business owner.
- •For in-house teams, save the guidelines in a Claude Project so every invoice from every firm is checked against the same text.
- •Do the arithmetic yourself before acting on totals, verify every quoted guideline section against the guidelines themselves, and treat the output as a draft for attorney review rather than an automatic reduction.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can in-house teams use this to review invoices from outside counsel?
Yes. Set your role to in-house counsel reviewing a received invoice and paste the guidelines you issued to the firm. The output works as a first-pass audit you can send back with specific citations to the guideline sections, which makes the conversation with the firm about facts rather than impressions. Decide reductions yourself, since some flagged items may have been approved by a business owner informally.
Why does the prompt only flag issues tied to guideline language?
Because a pre-bill review has to hold up when the client or the firm pushes back. An issue that quotes both the entry and the guideline section is easy to act on. A general sense that an entry looks high is not. The prompt lists general concerns separately so you still see them, without mixing them into the compliance findings.
How accurate are the dollar totals?
Treat them as a starting point. Claude can add and multiply, but it can misread a rate or apply a reduction the guidelines do not actually specify, and invoices pasted from PDFs sometimes lose columns. Check every total against your billing system before writing anything off, and do not rely on the prompt's arithmetic for the final invoice.
What if the guidelines are dozens of pages long?
Paste the billing, staffing, expense and approval sections rather than the whole document, and label them with their section numbers so the citations make sense. If a matter-specific budget or rate letter changes the general rules, paste it in the other approved terms field so Claude does not flag approved exceptions as violations.
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