Solicitor’s Charges
For my first job today I did some more work on Mr Jameson’s divorce proceedings.
Law firms charge for their services by the hour. The law firm of Nesbitt, Nesbitt & Anderson charge £60 per hour but top city firms can charge up to a £100 an hour or even more. The system for recording charges is simplicity itself. A log is kept by each solicitor in the practice in which he records the time spent working on the files of his various clients. Typically the log looks like this: –
Feb 8 2006
Mr G Baker 9.00 – 9.30
Mrs O.T. Threlfall 9.30 – 9.45
Mr J Jones 9.45 – 11.00
etc etc etc
For example on completion of Mr G Baker’s case all the entries in the log for Mr G Baker will then be added up and his bill made out. It is a system based on trust, and as such is wide open to abuse. For instance in the example above who is to say that the solicitor worked on Mr Baker’s file from 9.00 until 9.45 and didn’t work of Mrs Threlfall’s file at all that day?
By and large though, and certainly at Nesbitt, Nesbitt & Anderson, the system is adhered to honestly, although personally, whenever I need a shit, I always make a point of having it in a rich client’s time rather than a poor client’s. I think this must be the Robin Hood in me coming out.
On occasion though the system isn’t followed to the letter. As is the case with Mr Jameson and his divorce proceedings. When we met four weeks ago we recognised each other immediately. I recognised Mr Jameson as the physics teacher who used to make my life hell. He recognised me as one of the many hundreds of former pupils he’d taught over the years – but, unfortunately for him, not as the pupil whose life he had made hell.
I finished work on Mr Jameson’s file at 9.30, thirty minutes work, but I billed him for four hours. For the next three and a half hours I worked on five different files for which Nesbitt, Nesbitt & Anderson’s fee will be precisely nothing. Mr Jameson’s divorce is going to be very expensive.
Sawyer the Lawyer.
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