"Alternative fees" refers to different payment arrangements for services, beyond the traditional method of charging for time spent. It involves using alternative methods, such as flat rates, fixed fees, or performance-based charges, instead of billing based on the hours worked.
Full definition
The use
of alternative fee arrangements by lawyers and the demand for those arrangements by clients is increasing.
Second, the number of companies
using alternative fee arrangements for more than 20 % of their outside legal spend continues to grow.
Another priority is developing a cost - and - margin analysis model that would allow the firm to do a better job of coming up with proposals
for alternative fee arrangements.
If it seems like everywhere you go these days someone is talking
about alternative fee arrangements, you're not alone.
And his recommendations for success
in alternative fee arrangements — both to firms and to clients — are especially valuable.
As in - house counsel continue to experiment
with alternative fee arrangements, there has been a shift toward looking more at overall value — whatever fee arrangement is ultimately used.
We are result oriented and very creative when we collaborate with the client
on alternative fee agreements that estimate the cost of legal services.
Any new solo has to determine whether to go with the billable hour, a flat fee arrangement, or
other alternative fee structures.
Current topics include everything
from alternative fee arrangements to e-discovery to virtual law firms.
Our project management system is a key component of our commitment to serving clients
through alternative fee arrangements.
The organization argues that rapid technological changes,
alternative fee models and increasing scrutiny from clients are putting pressure on attorneys to prove their worth.
It helps in
negotiating alternative fee structures, and in and of itself such transparency leads to better and open communication with clients.
To accurately assess the risks and rewards requires a significant number of cases — the law of large numbers has to permit the experience and variety of circumstances necessary to
make alternative fees work.
The panelists offered strategies to drive down the cost of using outside counsel, to build collaboration between in - house counsel and junior outside counsel, and to
implement alternative fee arrangements.
's clients can choose to
utilize alternative fee arrangements such as fixed costs, capped fees and / or «value billing» (or a mix of all three).
I believe the «wolf in sheep's clothing» is the dominant methodology used by big firms, indeed, most firms to calculate
alternative fee proposals.
The insights highlighted here address a wide range of issues
including alternative fee arrangements, preventing waiver of the attorney - client privilege, diversity best practices, and document retention policies.
There is definitely some confusion around what are and what are
not alternative fee arrangements.
You're right that discussions around value billing seem to be dominated by simply
creating alternative fee structures or reducing the price.
As the legal business model shifts away from hourly billing
toward alternative fee structures, it's important for lawyers to develop an understanding of basic pricing principles in order to remain profitable.
The billable hour is still the dominant model for many law firms, but some practice areas are moving
towards alternative fee arrangements.
Today's law firms, although gradually adopting more
innovative alternative fee structures, are still very much driven by the billable hour.
When giving a speech a few months ago, I was asked by an in - house lawyer how a client was supposed to distinguish a
good alternative fee from a bad one.
Moreover, most clients do not consider discounts or blended hourly rates as
alternative fees because they still rely on the billable hour as a metric.
Clients are now much more sophisticated consumers of legal services — they have responded by demanding discounts and
requesting alternative fee structures from their advisers.
He's transformed how we
approach alternative fee arrangements, he knows how they calculate their rates and therefore we have pretty transparent conversations with firms.
Firms that have a handle on this and that take a proactive approach to
developing alternative fee arrangements with clients are achieving financial success.
The first is that firms genuinely believe they are using
alternative fees if they are using blended hourly rates or discounts.
This has reduced demand and created downward price pressure in the market, which gave rise to some
interesting alternative fee structures.
The clients of solo and small firms also tend to be less subject to the abuses of the billable hour and therefore less likely to
seek alternative fee arrangements.
A
true alternative fee arrangement is for example packaging the service as a product — delivering 3 documents drafts for $ 500 regardless of your time and efforts invested in the legal task.
There was a time when many lawyers, settled in their ways, thought that they could
ignore alternative fee arrangements.
Alternative fees help you to capitalize on your process improvements, because you're no longer wasting time on routine tasks.
Litigation finance can
enable alternative fee arrangements with law firms that are more flexible than the options that defence - oriented law firms will provide.
There is no question that law firms are undergoing several change management initiatives and
avoiding alternative fee arrangements is no longer a strategy.
Every law firm that seriously intends to
tackle alternative fee arrangements would clearly benefit from reviewing this work.