Calculating billable hours is straightforward: you take how much you've worked and multiply it by your hourly rate.
Why do lawyers bill in six-minute increments? Billing six minutes at a time is standard practice for practical reasons: Manually billing by the minute or in smaller increments is difficult and time-consuming to track and calculate by hand.
Unless someone told you otherwise, bill all the time you spend on a task, even if you know some of it will be marked down. At most firms, you will still get credit toward your billable hour goal for all the time you enter into the firm's billing software, even if not all of that time is billed to the client.
In the United States, an up-front fee paid to a lawyer is called a retainer. Money within the retainer is often used to "buy" a certain amount of work.
They can charge a set hourly rate for the time they spend working on your file, a flat fee for a specific service, or a contingency fee, which is based on a percentage of the outcome of the case. Most lawyers or paralegals will ask for some payment in advance, called a retainer.
To achieve 2,200 billable hours, an associate would work from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. each day, added to two Saturdays per month from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., which still would leave the associate a bit short. So add another Saturday for 10 months.
How to Bill a ClientCreate a (Verbal or Paper) Contract. Before you even begin working with a client, it's important to have a mutual agreement in place. ... Use a Template for Your Invoices. ... Simplify the Payment Process. ... Don't Hesitate to Send Out Invoices. ... Don't Be Too Shy to Follow Up. ... Being a Professional in Billing Clients.
It's not a complicated equation – the more hours you bill, the more revenue for the firm. Firms “average,” “target” or “minimum” stated billables typically range between 1700 and 2300, although informal networks often quote much higher numbers.
How do you calculate billable hours?Set an hourly rate.Track every billable hour on a timesheet.Add up your billable hours.Multiply total billable hours by billing rate.Add fees or taxes to the client's invoice.
Attorneys practicing in rural areas or small towns might charge $100-$200 per hour. A lawyer in a big city could charge $200-$400 per hour. Specialized lawyers with a lot of expertise in a specific area of law, such as patent or intellectual property law, could charge $500-$1,000 per hour.
For example, in a company or corporation, a general retainer fee would include charges for contract drafting, board resolutions, certifications, and the likes. Retainer fees vary greatly depending on the client's situation and most lawyers require a retainer agreement or contract.
Overview. A retainer fee can be any denomination that the attorney requests. It may be as low as $500 or as high as $5,000 or more. Some attorneys base retainer fees on their hourly rate multiplied by the number of hours that they anticipate your case will take.