Org admins, Finance owners and Engagement owners can create engagements. Select New engagement on the Engagements page.
Create an engagement
The work
| Field | What to enter |
|---|---|
| Engagement name | The name your team uses, for example "Claims API rebuild". |
| Job or matter code | The code usage is tagged with, such as NW-101. Use the code from your practice-management or billing system. Letters, numbers, dots, dashes and underscores, up to 40 characters. Each engagement needs its own code: don't reuse the code of a closed engagement. The code can't be changed once the engagement is created. |
| Client | Pick an existing client or add one with + New client. |
| Owner | The person who receives alerts and approves top-ups within their limit. Choose someone with the Engagement owner role. |
| Start date and end date | The end date is optional, but it gives you the even-pace line and a better forecast. |
The budget
| Field | What to enter |
|---|---|
| Budget in | Money or Tokens. As you type, Allcora shows the equivalent at your firm's model mix over the last 30 days. |
| Budget currency and amount | Any of the 20 supported currencies. |
| Bill the client in | The currency the client is invoiced in. It defaults to the budget currency and is used in the rebill export. |
| Basis | Internal cost or Billable to client. It's shown on the engagement as a label; it doesn't change the rebill export. |
Tick Save as a draft to set an engagement up before work starts. Drafts don't count against your plan's engagement limit and don't accept usage. To start one, use Pause or close → Pause, then Resume.
Thresholds start from the firm's defaults. Change them on the engagement afterwards; see Alerts, approvals and stops.
Currencies and exchange rates
Supported currencies: EUR, USD, GBP, CHF, JPY, CAD, AUD, NZD, SEK, NOK, DKK, PLN, CZK, SGD, HKD, CNY, INR, ZAR, BRL and MXN. Vendors report cost in US dollars. Allcora converts each record at the European Central Bank's reference rate for the day of the usage, and uses the latest working day's rate at weekends and on holidays. New rates are fetched every weekday after the ECB publishes them.
Suggest a budget Beta
Not sure what an engagement will need? Where Suggest a budget appears on New engagement, describe the work: what will be produced, roughly how many documents or pages, which AI tools the team will use and for how long. No client names are needed.
Allcora breaks the description into tasks, estimates the tokens for each and prices them with the model price table and your exchange rates. You get a likely range, the assumptions behind it and a suggested budget: the expected cost plus 15%, 25% or 40% contingency, depending on how confident the estimate is. Nothing is set for you; select Use amount as the budget or enter your own figure.
Once three engagements that started from a suggestion have closed, later suggestions are adjusted by how your actual spend compared with the estimates. Each firm can request 40 suggestions a day, and each person 12 an hour.
Reading an engagement
The engagement page shows spend against budget, the last 7 days' burn, when the budget runs out at the current pace and the projected spend at the end date. The forecast uses the last 14 days of spend. Figures not yet reconciled with the vendor are marked as estimates.
| Label | Meaning |
|---|---|
| On track | Spend is keeping pace with the time elapsed. |
| Not started | A draft. |
| Watch | Spend is running more than 5 points ahead of time elapsed, or an overrun is forecast. |
| At risk | Spend is running more than 20 points ahead of time elapsed, or an overrun is forecast with 75% or more used. |
| Over budget | The whole budget is used. |
Without an end date, Allcora treats an engagement as half way through, so it shows Watch above 55% used and At risk above 70%. Add an end date for a truer picture.
Change an engagement
Change budget sets a new original budget and asks for a reason, which is kept in the audit log. Org admins, Finance owners and the engagement's owner can use it. If the engagement is held at a gate, changing the budget doesn't release it, and thresholds already reached stay reached; approve a top-up instead, or edit the thresholds.
Edit people and details changes the name, owner, end date, basis and billing currency, and adds Contributors: people who see the engagement and can request top-ups. The billing currency is fixed once a locked month includes the engagement.
Pause, close or reopen
Use Pause or close on the engagement.
- Paused engagements still accept usage, but the Allcora CLI won't start new sessions for them. Thresholds don't fire while paused.
- Closed engagements lock the budget and figures and no longer appear on the Engagements page. New usage tagged to a closed engagement goes to the unattributed pool. Closing frees a place in your plan's engagement limit.
An Org admin or Finance owner can reopen a closed engagement from its page, reached from a link such as an approval email, or contact us and we'll send the link. Engagements and clients can't be deleted, so your history stays complete.
Plan limits
Starter includes 15 active engagements and Growth 100; Enterprise has no limit. Only active engagements count. At the limit, close an engagement or upgrade to add another.
Last reviewed 29 October 2026, Allcora platform version 15.