For all the talk
about alternatives to the billable hour, this recent article entitled «Eight law firms to share $ 30 million in Delta bankruptcy legal fees» demonstrates why that's never going to happen.
Writing in response to recent industry surveys, which confirm the legal industry's increased interest
in alternatives to the billable hour (aka AFAs), reporter Chris Johnson noted pure hourly billing is in decline and is expected to decline over the next few years.
He added that firms that had not looked to
provide alternatives to the billable hour and had not invested in mobile technologies and practice management solutions were more likely to be hit harder by market and competitive shocks.
Instead, firms are making modest «market corrections» such as cutting attorneys (both associates and partners), and relying more heavily on contract lawyers and experimenting
with alternatives to the billable hour.
As Tyler Langdon of Cognition LLP pointed out, external counsel's perspective should be that
advancing alternatives to the billable hour will: «strengthen relationships, increase market share, improve business opportunities and actually enhance profit.»
Writing in response to recent industry surveys, which confirm the legal industry's increased interest
in alternatives to the billable hour (aka AFAs), reporter Chris Johnson noted pure
The move is an acknowledgement of the shifting legal landscape and the desire of many clients for
alternatives to the billable hour.
If someone can give
me the alternative to the billable hour, I'm all ears.
For several years now, value pricing has been touted as
an alternative to the billable hour but many lawyers, myself included, have had some difficulty in figuring out how to apply it in practice.
In this post, I'm going to talk about
another alternative to the billable hour, flat - rate billing.
And they demand
alternatives to the billable hour, since the «longer I take, the more I make» paradigm is anathema to efficiency.
With pressure from the business increasing to reduce legal department costs, many buyers of legal services began requesting fee structures that were
an alternative to the billable hour, including fixed - and flat - fee engagements, putting the onus on law firms to improve their efficiency.
Everyone claims to offer fee structures that are
alternatives to the billable hour.
The entrepreneur in me longed to build something - a new firm model to give clients
an alternative to the billable hour for litigation.