LexThink To Do List: Create Billing Standard

I think everyone at LexThink agreed that the current hourly billing model needs substantial reform.  One thing that I want to see happen is for the LexThink group is to agree on a set of principles which we can subscribe to which formalizes new billing concepts and guidelines.  These are simple practical things such as :

1. no charging for copies and long distance;
2. no billing for  phone calls under 10 minutes (just the action items which come out of phone calls);
3. the difficulty of the task determines the fee rate, not the lawyer who happens to be assigned (thereby pushing easy stuff down to lower billing rate);
4. matching clients with billing structures which meet their needs (flat fee, contingency, value hour);
5. working within a client approved budget;
6. creating a documenting efficiency incentives;
7. the lawyer should take on some level of risk with each project.

This is an outcome I hope to work on over the next year.