A perfect way to fleece a client - the "minimum increment" billing policy

Any attorney who worked in a large law firm will tell you that the increment in billing their clients is 6 minutes.

What does that mean?

It means that no matter how much actual time your attorney have spent on reviewing, let's say, a 1-page letter from the court assigning a judge (even if it is a whole of 2 seconds), he will still charge you at 6 minutes, and if the attorney's hourly rate is from $175.00 an hour upwards (which is usually the case), you will be charged $17.50 and upwards instead of pennies.

Will you believe that your attorney stared, a presumably intelligent human being, hired for his/her intelligence, was staring at a sheet of paper that, let's say, said: "Judge XYZ was assigned to your case" for the whole of 6 minutes - that is 360 seconds, you can count to 360 while staring at a piece of paper to see how long that is - while doing what?  Providing you a professional legal service?  At upwards of $175.00 an hour?  A stare for 6 minutes straight at a sheet of paper with a name of a judge is provision of a professional service?

It is insane to believe this, isn't it?

Do you have enough money to give away to people who stare at pieces of paper for 6 minutes?

If your attorney needs 6 minutes to stare at a letter assignment of a judge, what kind of legal services such an attorney can provide you?

Of course, your attorney never stared at a sheet of paper for 6 minutes, he or she is really not that stupid.

He simply used his firm's "policy" that no matter how short was his cursory glance at the assignment of a judge (and possibly, his secretary just told him who is assigned and he did not even look at that letter), the "policy" is to bill at 6-minute's increments.

So, the attorney is determined to fleece you of the full 6 minutes' worth of his time, at $175.00 an hour, even though no professional services you hired the attorney to provide, were provided to you during those 6 minutes.  

Why this fleecing is occurring?

Because you did not say "no".

And because you are not saying "no", your attorney from a large law firm can bill you repeatedly for reviewing separate 1-page documents at 6 minutes' increments instead of for the actual time he or she spent working on your case.

If litigation is long enough, and often it lasts for years, you will be paying through your nose for air, simply for time added to the actual time worked because of the "billing increment" policy of the law firm - or because their billing software works only in 6 minutes increments.

Of course, disciplinary rules prohibit attorneys to bill for time not actually worked and for services not actually provided.

But who cares?  Certainly not the large law firms.

The way around disciplinary rules for law firms are - to hire a number of governmental officials, their relatives, and especially those who are related to or worked for a judge.

With such a live shield, no discipline will ever be even attempted against such law firms, and they can continue to happily fleece their clients, at 6-minute increments.

How to fight this robbery?

Of course, to ask your attorney to specifically put into the written retainer agreement that you agree to pay only for the time actually worked, not for the billing increment policy of the law firm, and certainly not for how their billing software works.

You are the master of your own retainer agreement, so it is in your power to stop the robbery.

Say "no" to the 6-minute "minimum increment" billing by large law firms.