Interesting Article on Alternative Fees and Hourly Rates
From the Denver Post. One highlight:
With corporations slashing their legal budgets, more law firms are offering or accepting these kinds of cost-saving fee arrangements. The billable hour, while still the dominant form of billing, is under assault.
"Legal fees continue to increase at a very high rate, and I think companies are also becoming more careful as to how they spend their legal dollars," said Richard Baer, executive vice president and general counsel for Qwest. "As a result they're just more critical in their decisions about who they're going to retain and what they're going to have those law firms do."
Since joining Qwest in 2002, Baer has reduced the company's reliance on national law firms that charge top dollar and reduced its legal staff.
Be sure to read the comments. Some interesting insights.