In mid-December 2022, CARES will stop requiring you to enter any case dates, i.e., the "Date Opened by Court" or the date the court closed a case. This is to streamline and minimize your data entry.
Instead, you only need to focus on accurate child party dates and activity dates; these are what OCR uses (and has always used) to determine your appointment dates for important reports and billing audits. The earliest child party start date you enter on your appointment automatically becomes the appointment start date behind the scenes. After all child parties have Representation End Dates, the latest of those is also your Appointment End Date. CARES uses all the appointment dates (among different offices if applicable) on any case to calculate the case dates behind the scenes.
Learn more about entering dates and how dates are interdependent in Entering Dates. See how to enter an end for an appointment in Closing Appointments.
Learn about how to enter your role for each youth and, starting 1/9/23, show the timeline of your shift from best interests to client-directed, if applicable, in Attorney Role(s) per Youth.