Northern District of Illinois · N.D. Ill. · 7th Circuit

CJA eVoucher Timekeeping
for N.D. Ill. Panel Attorneys

PanelTime™ is the only AI tool that converts your CJA timesheet — handwritten, Word, Excel, Google Docs, or PDF — into an eVoucher-ready file automatically. No manual data entry. No service codes to look up.

Convert your timesheet →

Abbreviation

N.D. Ill.

Divisions

Chicago (Eastern) · Rockford (Western)

Circuit

7th Circuit

About the District

Northern District of Illinois — Federal Court Overview

The United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois serves the northern portion of Illinois and is one of the busiest federal courts in the Midwest. The court operates two divisions — the Eastern Division in Chicago, headquartered at the Everett McKinley Dirksen United States Courthouse, and the Western Division in Rockford. The Eastern Division in Chicago handles the vast majority of the district's caseload.

The Northern District's federal criminal docket is substantial and varied, with significant caseloads in drug trafficking, gang-related offenses, firearms, fraud, and public corruption — including several high-profile public corruption prosecutions in recent decades. The CJA panel in N.D. Ill. is active and includes attorneys who handle everything from short-cause misdemeanor appeals to multi-defendant conspiracy trials spanning years.

CJA panel administration in the Northern District is managed through the court's CJA office. Panel attorneys submit CJA-20 vouchers through the national eVoucher platform. PanelTime™ works with both CJA-20 and CJA-21 voucher types and is compatible with the eVoucher system used in this district.

How it works

From timesheet to eVoucher in three steps

Works with any format N.D. Ill. panel attorneys already use.

Upload your timesheet — handwritten notes, Word, Excel, Google Docs, PDF, or any format you already use, as long as it has a date, description, and hours. (see requirements)

PanelTime™ reads your entries — automatically assigns the correct eVoucher service codes, sorts services from expenses, and builds a clean import file. No service code lookup needed.

Import into N.D. Ill. eVoucher with one click. Use our free Chrome extension to automatically populate your expenses tab as well. Services and expenses, done.

✓

Review, correct, and submit — you stay in control. PanelTime™ only works from what you recorded. It removes the manual retyping step; the voucher is still yours to approve.

Common questions

N.D. Ill. panel attorneys ask

Does PanelTime™ work with the N.D. Ill. eVoucher system?

Yes. PanelTime™ produces a CSV formatted for the national eVoucher platform used by all 94 federal districts, including N.D. Ill. in both the Chicago (Eastern) and Rockford (Western) divisions.

Do I need to know the CJA service codes?

No. PanelTime™ reads your time entry descriptions and assigns the correct eVoucher service codes automatically. You review the result before importing and can correct anything.

Can I use my existing handwritten timesheet?

Yes — take a photo or scan it and upload the image or PDF. As long as your sheet has a date, description of work, and hours, PanelTime™ can read it.

What about expenses — travel to Rockford, copies, parking?

PanelTime™ separates expenses from time entries automatically. Our free Chrome extension then imports your expenses into eVoucher's expenses tab with one click.

Does this work for CJA-21 service providers in the Northern District?

Yes. For investigators, interpreters, and experts, include your hourly rate on the timesheet — for example, "RATE = $85" — and PanelTime™ calculates compensation automatically for CJA-21 vouchers.

Free templates