Billing

Our billing practices unquestionably result in lower bills and less aggravation for our clients. Other firms use time costing; this involves the solicitor completing a time sheet each day, which is then entered into the billing system. Solicitors are under pressure to meet daily billing targets and, when they cannot remember where the time went at the end of the day, they tend to pad items in order to make up the difference.

Solicitors at Bransgroves do not have billing targets and they do not enter their own time. Instead, we use an "evidence based" system, this involves an independent billing clerk reviewing all documents created each day and, using formal cost assessment principles, determining what time to enter for each document. The result is that the billing is more even and more accurately reflects what has been done on each file.

Due to our more accurate billing our clients are better able to understand how costs were incurred and less likely to become aggravated. For our institutional clients, this approach also allows them to tailor their interaction with us in order to keep costs to a minimum.

All bills are emailed in pdf format with a full itemisation of all costs and disbursements. The itemisation generally reflects the names of the files in question. This allows our clients to review the bill by reference to a copy of our file. Our billing clerk is extremely efficient and ensures that:

1.  We never fail to bill at least monthly. If an intense period is afoot we bill even more frequently, sometimes even daily, so that our clients receive no nasty surprises; 
2. We do not charge for copying or forwarding incoming emails to our clients; 
3. We do not charge clients for brief telephone calls;
4. We do not charge clients for photocopying or faxing fees;
5. When we attend a directions list we divide the bill between the matters we have in that list; 
6. Every item we bill is evidenced by a document that the client has seen. We never charge for “reviewing the file” or “researching” or other intangible items that lawyers use to pad bills; 
7. If a client disputes an item or items on our bill we generally concede the point and move on.