When I practised law in Mississauga, Ont., our fees were cheap compared to the Toronto firms, and kind of expensive compared to firms in places like Guelph, Belleville and Kingston. I occasionally wondered whether my clients might prefer to deal with firms in smaller cities at lower rates. Then I would reassure myself that doing so would be terribly inconvenient for them and that they would rather pay more to deal with me.
Now I am not so sure.
Many years ago, Maurice called me to complain about a legal bill that he had received. Fortunately, it was not me who had drawn his ire, although I was his primary legal counsel.
Maurice’s accountant had convinced him to go to a meeting with Peter, a very sophisticated tax lawyer, to discuss something called the ‘Quebec Shuffle.’
Near the end of my career, at a time when I frequently congratulated myself (since no one else would listen) about how brilliant I was at dealing with clients, I lost a long-standing client who I will call Charles. I should have fired Charles years before and was holding onto for some twisted sentimental reason.
Long ago, when it came to billing, lawyers addressed precedents in one of two ways:
Many of you will be familiar with the old saying (sometimes attributed to John Adams and other times to Winston Churchill) to the effect that “if you are not a socialist at age 20, you have no heart, but if you are still a socialist at age 30, you have no brain.”
I never met a lawyer who loved to docket their time, but I have met a number of lawyers (myself included) who were very good at it. I met many, many more lawyers who were not so good at it.
Maybe someday we will be completely rid of the billable hour, but even if that comes to pass, it will still be important for lawyers to be able to analyze how they are spending their time, if only to understand how to set fixed fees.
So, there we are. We all hate docketing. We all need to be good at it. Here it is. Fully explained. In small words. At last.
“The bitterness of poor quality remains long after the sweetness of low price is forgotten” is a quote frequently attributed to Benjamin Franklin. Quite true, but it is more complicated than that when we are dealing with things, such as legal services, that the consumer often does not understand.
Back in grade two, the class bully and I got hauled off the principal’s office who demanded to know why we were fighting in the school yard. I explained, “he said shut up. I said make me. He was making me.” I learned fairly early in life that our words and actions have consequences.
Years ago, a young person I know was quite proud to show me his first credit card. I was underwhelmed and said: “Big deal. Anyone can get a credit card with their own name on it. The trick is to get a credit card with someone else’s name on it.”
I was reminded of that incident recently when I got a notice in the mail from a major insolvency firm telling me that a fund which I had unwisely invested in was insolvent, the insolvency firm had been appointed as the receiver, and a large law firm has been appointed as ‘representative counsel.’ Now I had reason to worry that all was lost.