Users Accounts and Contact Records
All users in LegalServer automatically have a contact record created in addition to their user record. This means all users are also contacts, but all contacts are not users.
Most contacts are other people an agency wants to maintain in the database, for example donors, judges, other attorneys, etc.
Contacts can generally be added by any user, but user records can only be created and edited by someone whose user role has the "Add/Edit Users" permission.
Administrator note: Contacts who are not users may have a "Make this contact a user" action link on their contact profile page.
Who Needs to be a User
A person needs to be a user, not just a contact, if they need to:
- Record time (or have time recorded for them, for example a volunteer attorney), or
- To be assigned to cases. Contacts can be linked to cases, but cannot be a primary assignment, additional assignment, or pro bono assignment.
Staff and Pro Bono
Users are generally split into two groups - Pro Bono users and Staff users (Staff equals everyone who is not a pro bono user).
Pro Bono users show up anywhere that requires "pro bono" advocates (e.g., Pro Bono Assignments, Outreach Pro Bono Attendees, Pro Bono timeslips, etc). The "Pro Bono" Advocate/User Type makes a user a pro bono user.
Staff users will appear in the dropdown lists throughout LegalServer as staff members (e.g., they appear in the primary assignment list, the list of people doing intakes, etc). Users with an Advocate/User Type of anything other than "Pro Bono" are treated as staff.