“你们是怎么应对那种付得起我的时薪，却总把每月的账单当成生意来砍价的客户的？”

Institutional clients are different, but with individual clients and business lit that was more on the “one off” side, the thing that generally kept me out of these situations, I think, is that I was always pretty good at giving the client a real good idea what was going to be required and what it would cost over what period of time.

If something crazy happened, I communicated that to the client well in advance of sending out a bill that would decapitate them.

I generally would make sure my estimates were going to err on the high side if they erred at all.

If I just flat missed an estimate because there was an aspect I hadn’t considered due to my own lack of experience, I generally ate that time and let the client know it by writing it off the bill.

It doesn’t take most clients long to recognize and appreciate that a professional is treating them fairly. By the same token, it doesn’t take them long to SUSPECT that they may be being taken advantage of if the communication sucks and the lawyer does “block billing” (ie, 25 tasks lumped together with a single time entry at the end).

I did not love working on the insurer side in the early part of my career, but it was great training in defensive billing. Those MF’rs treated bill reduction like a sport.

Another tactic is to ask the client what level of production value s/he expects. The rates may be one annoying thing (that definitely have increased) but the hours are honestly the greater piece of the equation. Do your matters involve associates? Ask your client what exactly it is that is hitting him wrong about the invoice. Also, people of that level - it's their personal money or limited funds from a tight budget AND often a misunderstanding that every second you're emailing/speaking with them is a clock running on their invoice. There is no free time.

I never quibble with my experienced counselors - I call and ask questions, I get answers, the time matches my expectations, I pay the full amount quickly. Where I get highly frustrated is on on bigger projects with several attorneys, and it's clear the principal associates are running the meter. Specialists seem to get in/out of the matter efficiently, but (for example) a second year is spending 10 hours nailing down a piece of information on a disclosure schedule that is a $2,000 matter. You don't see it to stop them, it was "real" hours because they did work them, but it was inefficient to the client. The client spends $10,000 on a $2,000 risk. That's where the client feels exceptionally irritated even though work was done.

Curious, honest question here.....are these just "want $x or x% off total" or....."look, associate billed 50 hours for an MSJ and, in this case, it's not warranted....let's reduce it to 15 hours?" As GC of a state agency that's had to utilize outside counsel (in lieu of the state AG), part of my job is to "green eye shade" and "red pencil" bills from outside counsel not just because....but as part of duty to make sure fee and taxpayers are getting the bang for their buck. It helps, I think, that I've been on the outside counsel side of the billing equation.....look, I'm not gonna bark if I think something could be done in 10 hours and it got billed as 13 hours. But, I am going to ask for a copy of a document/memo that was (allegedly) drafted that for one reason or another I've not seen, wasn't filed in court, or whatever. 90% of the time outside counsel will get the "benefit of the doubt" in those cases that fall somewhere between those two examples. I get and understand "rabbit holes" (fallen down a few myself) and "false starts," (yep, guilty) -- but my boss (a non-lawyer) is going to ask me "whether we got $x value in return"...... and "value" doesn't necessarily align with x hours billed at $y hourly rate.

And this is where it might help if the final bill actually "showed" the reductions being made to the bill by, say, the billing partner. For example: "J. Associate....50 hours.....draft and prepare MSJ including preparing SUMF, Memo in Support, and Motion....filed with Court.........minus 25 hours = 25 hours x $yyyy per hour = $zzzz."

Show me you've reviewed the bill Mr. or Ms. Billing Partner. Show me that YOU have some understanding of what being a *consumer* of your legal product is --- not just a producer of the same.