Value to Our Clients

We educate ourselves about your business and industry on our dime, not yours, so we can be an effective business partner, and more than just a counselor or advisor.

We understand our clients’ needs for value and predictability in outside counsel expenses, and we have worked with many of our clients to develop alternative billing arrangements that are appropriate for their needs and the specific matters at hand. Below are some examples of alternative fee arrangements that we have used successfully with our clients. We have brought additional value to our client relationships with alternative fee arrangements in individual cases, class-actions cases and multi-district litigation. We would be happy to provide more specific examples of each arrangement described below.

Volume Discount: We have entered into agreed upon percentage discounts with our clients. In these arrangements, the discount increases as the volume of billing increases, based on a preapproved and pre-determined scale.

Success Fee: We have typically structured these as hourly arrangements using discounted rates. If the outcome of the case or matter is successful (the definition of “success” is mutually agreed on with our client in advance) then an additional amount becomes due.

Capped Fee: We have agreed to handle a case, project, phase or task on an hourly basis up to a budgeted amount/fee cap.

Flat Fee: We have entered into flat fee arrangements with our clients which take the form of monthly or annual retainer arrangements in which a defined set of services is offered on a recurring basis.

Other modified versions of flat fees we have used include:

• Phase Fee: We have created arrangements with varying flat fees for different stages/phases of litigation, deals, specific projects or tasks. These fees may also be combined with hourly billing arrangements, as mutually agreed.
• Flat Fee Reconciled: We have entered into arrangements in which both parties agree on a flat fee and related conditions under which that fee may be reconciled later against a pre-determined benchmark.

Contingent Fee: We have negotiated contingent fee arrangements in cases where our client is the plaintiff, and the potential recovery and the estimated effort to achieve that recovery, make such a risk-sharing arrangement feasible for the client and the firm. We have used modified contingent fee arrangements in defense cases where the firm receives a fixed enhancement over hourly rates for early disposition of the matter through dismissal, summary judgment, or early mediation, as mutually agreed.

We offer free educational/training sessions for your in-house staff as well as helping link your in-house staff with other professional development opportunities like speaking and writing engagements.

We understand the pressures our clients face to stay within their budgets. To this end, we will work closely with you to make sure we approach each case, transaction and project with a sharp eye on budgetary discipline.
This means:

• we will frequently review with you the status of the work to ensure the matter is proceeding according to budget
• we will aggressively manage local counsel costs
• we will staff cases, transactions and projects with the appropriate personnel who can provide necessary services most efficiently
• we will not charge for travel time unless work is being performed during that time
• we can offer client extranets and e-discovery hubs to provide efficient document management which saves on time and money

Yes, that’s right.  We do not charge for online research!