Welcome to phase 3 of your data migration journey, where you access your firm through a trial environment.
What is a trial environment?
The trial environment is a first look at what your data looks like in Smokeball. The main goal is to confirm that the data's accurate and pinpoint any concerns with our migration technician.
Your data migration specialist will provide you with a Trial Environment Checklist that you will use to check data accuracy and record comments. Aim to complete the checklist over the next 2 weeks.
Do not attempt to fix any errors you find in the trial environment. Instead, note them down in the Trial Environment Checklist. We may provide a second trial environment for your firm to approve if needed.
If you need to enter real data, enter it in your current software. We will do a final data collection close to launch date.
What information will not be available in the trial environment?
- Documents - these are normally processed 3-5 days after the migration
- Billing data - Billing is not always set up at this point of the migration process
- Trust balances - you'll manually enter this data post-migration during the Trust Transition training session
- Personalised letterheads and settings
- Other items specified by your data migration specialist
The trial environment checklist
Ready to get started? Follow each section below to enter the trial environment and start checking your data.
- In the Windows search bar, search for Remote Desktop Connection and select it.
- Your data migration specialist will provide you with an IP address. Type this into the Computer field, then select Show Options from the bottom-left corner of the window.
- Enter the username provided by your data migration specialist, then select Connect.
- You'll be asked to enter a password. Enter the password provided by your data migration specialist, then select OK.
- The trial environment will load and you'll have access to the data.
Important Notes:
- Only one person can be logged into the trial environment at any time.
- If the trial asks you to perform a Smokeball update, please ignore the message.
Staff & Users
Let's make sure your firm's users in Smokeball are accurate and correct.
Note: Please ignore the "data migration" user in the user list. This will be deactivated post-migration.
How to access user information
- Select the settings cog icon located on the top-right corner of Smokeball.
- A new window will open. Select Staff & Users from the left pane.
- Check that all users from your firm are listed here.
- You may see some previous staff members in this list because they may have some old notes or memos attached to them. They will not use up a license and can be set as former staff later on.
- Enter your notes in the Trial Environment Checklist provided by your data migration specialist.
- Once you've finished this part of the checklist, navigate back to the Staff & Users window and select Cancel to move on to the next item to check.
Contacts
Let's check if your contacts have been migrated correctly and accurately, and that they've been connected to the correct matter.
How to view your contacts
- Select Contacts from the left menu.
- Double-click on any contact in the list and a window will pop up with their details. This window is referred to as the Contact Card.
- Check the contact's details and their address against your current system. Note down any discrepancies in the Trial Environment Checklist.
- Select Cancel on the bottom-right corner of the contact card to exit this window.
- We recommend checking at least 10 contact cards (5 people cards and 5 company cards) at random and comparing them with your current system.
How to check if matters are connected to the right contact
- Double-click on a contact card, then select the Matters tab at the top of the window.
- You'll be presented with the matters that this contact is linked to. Note down any discrepancies in the Trial Environment Checklist.
Double-click on the matter to view it in the Matter window.
- Select Cancel on the bottom-right corner of the contact card to exit this window.
- We recommend checking at least 10 contact cards (5 people cards and 5 company cards) at random and comparing them with your current system.
Matters
Let's check if your matters have been migrated properly.
How to check if matter details match the matter description
- Select Matters from the left menu.
- Double-click on a matter to open the matter window.
- Double-click on the Info line to display the matter information window.
- Check the information here against your current system and answer the questions presented in the Trial Environment Checklist.
- Select Cancel to exit this window, and close the matter window by clicking on the X on the top-right corner.
- We recommend checking at least 5 matters for discrepancies.
How to check if contact details are accurate on matters
- Double-click on a matter to open the matter window.
- Double-click on the Client, Other Side or Other Side Solicitor line to open their contact card.
- Check the information here against your current system and answer the questions presented in the Trial Environment Checklist.
- Select Cancel to exit this window, and close the matter window by clicking on the X on the top-right corner.
- We recommend checking at least 5 matters for discrepancies.
How to check if memos attached to a matter are correct
Memos and notes from your current system are brought over to Smokeball under the Memos section of a matter.
- Double-click on a matter to open the matter window.
- Select the Memos tab. Your memos will be listed on this page.
- Check that the memos listed in this matter are the correct memos as per your current system. Note down any discrepancies in the Trial Environment Checklist.
- We recommend checking at least 5 matters for discrepancies.
How to check if a matter type was imported correctly
Matter types from your current system might be different in Smokeball.
If Smokeball doesn't have a suitable matter type available in your current system, the matter will be placed under the General matter type.
We try to map all matter types as accurately as possible, and your data migration specialist will let you know if there will be any changes compared to your current system.
- Select Matters from the left menu.
- The Type column will list the matter type of all matters. Click on the Type column to sort the list of matters alphabetically by matter type.
- Right-click the column headings to add or remove columns from the view.
- Check that the matter types are correct for at least 5 matters. Note down any discrepancies in the Trial Environment Checklist.
Tasks
If you've opted to migrate tasks into Smokeball, follow the steps below. If you haven't, you can skip this step and move on to Billing.
How to check tasks
- Select Tasks from the left menu. All your tasks should be listed in this section.
- View tasks assigned to specific users by selecting the Assignees drop-down menu from the filters.
- Answer the questions provided in your Trial Environment Checklist.
Billing
Let's check that your time, fixed fee, disbursement and invoice entries have been migrated over properly.
How to check time, fee and disbursement entries
- Double-click on a matter from the Matters section on the left menu. This will open up the matter in a new window.
- Select the Time & Disbursements tab.
- On the left-hand side of the screen, select the Time & Fees tab. This will display all time and fixed fee entries attached to this matter.
- Double-click on a time/fee entry to view more details. Use the Trial Environment Checklist to compare them to your current system and note down discrepancies.
- We recommend checking at least 5 time entries across various matters.
- We recommend checking at least 5 time entries across various matters.
- Go back to the matter window and select the Disbursements tab next to the Time & Fees tab. This will display disbursement entries attached to the matter.
- Double-click on a disbursement entry to view more details. Use the Trial Environment Checklist to compare them to your current system and note down discrepancies.
- We recommend checking at least 5 disbursement entries across various matters.
- We recommend checking at least 5 disbursement entries across various matters.
- To check invoices, navigate to either the Time & Fees or Disbursements tab. In the list of entries, go to the Billed? column. This column shows a list of invoice numbers that are linked to the entry. Answer the questions in the Trial Environment Checklist around invoices.
- We recommend checking at least 5 invoices across various matters.
- We recommend checking at least 5 invoices across various matters.
What's next?
Once you've completed the Trial Environment Checklist, send it back to your data migration specialist so that any comments and concerns you've raised from the trial environment can be addressed.