Why is card spend a manual job in esiLaw 360?
esiLaw 360 publishes no public API, so no card platform can feed transactions into it directly. Firm card spend arrives as a statement, and bookkeeping turns it into entries by hand — separating client disbursements from firm overhead, assigning each disbursement to its matter, and keying the results into esiLaw 360.
What goes wrong with the manual routine?
Two things, reliably. Disbursements miss their matters: a filing fee paid on a card in March is a mystery by April, so it lands in overhead and never reaches the client's bill. And the close drags: receipts trickle in, coding questions bounce between bookkeeping and lawyers, and the card statement is the last thing reconciled every month.
How does Vergo automate the esiLaw 360 import?
Vergo captures the coding when the spend happens. Lawyers and staff buy on Vergo cards; at the point of purchase they attach the receipt and code the charge — to a client matter if it is a disbursement, to a GL account if it is firm expense. Bookkeeping reviews the coded transactions in Vergo, then exports a custom-built CSV matched to the import format esiLaw 360 expects and loads it.
What is the step-by-step?
1. Issue Vergo cards to lawyers and staff who spend.
2. At purchase, the cardholder attaches the receipt and codes the charge to a matter or GL account.
3. Bookkeeping reviews and approves transactions in Vergo, resolving any coding questions in-app.
4. Export approved transactions as a CSV built for esiLaw 360's import format.
5. Import the file into esiLaw 360 and reconcile against the card statement.
What does the firm get out of it?
Disbursements reach client bills because matters are captured at purchase. Receipts are attached to every transaction, which keeps trust-adjacent record-keeping clean. And the month-end card reconciliation shrinks from an afternoon of keying to a review and a file load.
Why does the import cadence matter for a law firm?
Because disbursements age badly. A court fee imported into esiLaw 360 the same week it was paid gets onto the client's next bill; the identical fee sitting on an unreconciled card statement for six weeks risks missing a billing cycle entirely or being quietly written off. Running the Vergo export weekly keeps matter costs current for billing, while a month-end-only import still beats manual keying but leaves recoverable client costs waiting longer than they should. Either cadence works mechanically — the file generates in minutes from already-approved transactions — so the choice comes down to how quickly the firm wants its costs to reach client bills.
Can I connect a card feed directly to esiLaw 360?
No. esiLaw 360 publishes no public API, so there is no live card feed. Transactions enter the platform by manual entry or file import.
How do disbursements get to the right matter?
Cardholders code each purchase to its matter in Vergo at the point of sale, and bookkeeping reviews before export — so matter allocation happens while the context is fresh.
What file does Vergo produce?
A custom-built CSV export matched to the import format esiLaw 360 expects, generated from reviewed and approved transactions.
How long does month-end take with this in place?
The import itself takes minutes. Coding and receipts accumulate continuously in Vergo, so the card statement stops being the bottleneck of the firm's close.
