Matter Dashboard - Calendar

The “Calendar” tab contains all matter-related appointments and reminders. The appointments can be set in three different ways: 

• Manual Events: By right-clicking (or double-clicking) on any date in the calendar and filling out the information (similar to Outlook).
• Task-Based Events: Generated automatically based on tasks defined in the matter template.
• Limitation (Court Rule) Events: Set up limitations/triggers (e.g., Trial) using court rules or limitation dates set at the template level. 

Calendar View vs List View

 The user can toggle between Calendar View and List View by clicking on the “List View” button on the tool bar. 

• Using the List View, the user can see appointments/reminders across multiple months by changing the date filter on the toolbar above the calendar.
• The user can tag or delete multiple events in List View.
• In Calendar View, the user can click on the dropdown menu beside “today” to navigate to any month or year. 
• The user can also toggle the calendar view to Day, Week, Month or Agenda view. 

Filter / Search

The user can use the Free Search textbox or the filters in the tool bar to filter and find appointments. 

• Use the Free Search textbox at the top of the calendar to find all events that have a text match in the subject or body of appointments.
• Filter the appointment by:
  1. Dates (in List View).
  2. Assignee (events assigned to certain people).
  3. Tags - filter all events with the same tag (e.g., events grouped together).

Add Appointments (Events)

To add appointments manually, double-click on any date within Calendar View (or use the “New Event” button in List View) and the system will open a pop-up screen to enter appointment information. 

• Owner: By default, the appointment owner is set to matter owner. 
• Reminder: Sets Outlook appointment reminder.
• Event Code: Pre-defined event codes to pre-populate the subject and narrative. Event codes can be set in configurations.
• Distribution List: Assign the appointment to a group of users defined as the “Distribution List”. The administrator can set up distribution lists under configurations.
• External Attendees: Add and invite external contacts. The system will email them calendar invites.
• Attachments: Attach one or multiple files to the appointment. The attachments will be available as a link in Outlook in the appointment body. 
• Recurrence: Allows the user to create recurrent appointments (Daily, Weekly, Monthly, or Yearly). 

Recurrent Events

When creating an event, the user can click on the “Recurrence” button within the appointment screen to set up a recurrent event. Recurrent events are created separately but are connected to each other and can be modified individually. When modifying a recurring event, the system will ask the user if they want to:

• Modify the event series. 
• Modify the instance.

Modifying the event series will change all recurrent events. However, modifying an instance of recurrent events will disconnect that event from other recurrent events.

Reminders

Reminders are special appointments which refer to an appointment in MatterAlert. In Outlook they appear as separate appointments but still display the appointment information (e.g., date, body, or matter information). However, the reminders’ subject in Outlook starts with an “RMD” prefix to allow the user to differentiate them from actual appointments – where the appointment subject starts with “EVT” as event. 

 Unlimited reminders can be setup for an event and can be assigned to different users. To create (or view) reminders, right-click on any appointments and select “Reminders”.  

Modify Event

Users who have Read and Write access to the matter dashboard can modify an event by double-clicking on the event or dragging and dropping it to another date. 

• Any changes to an event will be logged to include the date and the person who modified the event. 
• The Event Owner and all assignees will receive an “in-app” notification. If email notifications are set on the configuration, the attendees and owner will receive an email notification as well. 
• External attendees will receive an email with an updated calendar invite. 
• If the appointment was created by the automated template or Court Rule, the user will receive a warning message indicating the appointment is generated by Tasks or Court Rule.
• If the appointment is created based on Task (e.g., Matter template tasks), the corresponding Task will be updated. 
• If any other appointments were created based on this appointment (via Matter Template), changing the appointment date will change all related appointment dates. 
• If an appointment has reminders (other calendar appointments as reminders) changing the appointment date will change the related reminders date accordingly. 

Tags / Event Grouping

 To group related events together (e.g., arbitration appointments), the user can “Tag” events. To tag events:

• Switch to List View. 
• Select one or more events. 
• Click on “Tag Events”. 
• Select Tags (or add new tags if not found on the list). 

Note: Tags can be removed from multiple appointments using the same feature above.

Deleting Multiple Events

Follow these steps to delete multiple events:

• Switch matter calendar to the List View mode.
• Select multiple events.
• Click on “Delete Events” button 
• The system will ask for confirmation and will delete those events. 
• System will send notification to the event owner and assignee to notify them about the deleted appointments. 
• System will remove appointments from all attendees’ Outlook calendars. 

Note: Past events cannot be deleted.

Reporting / Exporting Events

 At any time, users can click on the “Export” button on the matter calendar toolbar to generate a report (to view) or export as an excel or PDF file. The user can modify the filter to find all appointments or reminders related to the matter across several months.        

Event Audit Logs

 Any changes or modifications to matter events (e.g., add/delete/update) will be logged with the date/time, the user who performed the action, as well as the action itself.

• To see the Audit Log for an event, right-click on the event and select “Show Change Log”.
• To see Audit Log for the matter calendar, click on the “Logs” button on the calendar tool bar. 

Time-Zone

When setting up a matter, the user can set the default time-zone for the matter. In the matter calendar, the time-zone is set based on the user’s time-zone which is input from the browser to ensure the user will see the appointment based on their current time zone. The user can change the time-zone from the calendar toolbar to see the appointment in a different time-zone. This does not change the matter’s default time-zone, and only shows the appointment in the time-zone the user set in the matter calendar. 

Note: Changing the time-zone may cause the “All Day” events to fall into two consecutive days.