The clock on a closed case is one month
When a case ends, the clock starts on your last day of work on it.
- Within a month, you get paid in full.
- A month to two months late, CPCS pays you 10 percent less.
- More than two months late, it does not pay at all, unless the Chief Counsel finds extraordinary circumstances.
So the simple version: bill a closed case inside a month (Assigned Counsel Manual, Chapter 5, Section L).
Year-end bills: July 31 is the line
The state fiscal year ends June 30. Anything you have not billed by then goes on a year-end bill, and that bill has to reach CPCS by July 31 for full pay. Through August, they cut it 10 percent. On September 1 it is gone, again barring an extraordinary-circumstances finding (Manual, Section L). One quirk to know: you cannot send a year-end bill before June 15.
One interim bill per case, per month
While a case is open, you can send one interim bill per NAC each month, and that is the ceiling (Manual, Section R). You cannot squeeze a second interim bill for the same case into the same month, so bill it when there is enough on it to be worth billing.
The 15th and month-end are payday, not deadlines
You will hear the 15th and the last day of the month mentioned. Those are when CPCS batches bills for payment, not deadlines you can blow. A bill in good order by the 15th heads to the state within about a week, and one in by month-end goes about a week after that (Manual, Section KK). Missing them just moves you to the next payment run.
How Plani helps
Plani logs your time as you go, so when a case closes or the year turns over, the bill is already built and you are not racing a deadline. Ask it to send your billing report whenever you want and it emails it over.