Lawyers are widely seen as professional fat cats – living off the cream of their extortionate fees. The reality is that many firms are dogged by poor cash flow, chaotic billing cycles and lowered profitability through late billing, discounting and unrealistic fee capping. Why?
The reasons given by lawyers generally comprise a stream of excuses: ‘I do not have time – I am earning fees’; ‘I am a lawyer not an accountant’; ‘The computer system does not work’; ‘I do not have the information’. But these justifications simply mask the real reasons why lawyers are reluctant to demand the fees they are due for their expertise. While the reason offered by the finance director of a large UK firm, that lawyers are ‘insecure, difficult and cannot communicate’, might appear harsh in the extreme, this assessment does touch on the myriad of psychological blocks to effective, timely billing. So what are these blocks?
