Law Firm Outsourcing?

I read this article at Law.com that discusses how lawyers are considering outsourcing their support staff to overseas countries.

Here's my favorite quote from the article:

Short said the case for outsourcing is compelling. Given an estimated 30 percent to 60 percent cost savings in support tasks, he said, outsourcing could potentially free funds for firms to hire more lawyers.

But law firms might just as likely use the savings to increase partners' compensation. Though corporations can point to shareholder benefit or increased research and development spending in justifying outsourcing, law firms are vulnerable to charges that such moves are motivated only by greed.

What the article doesn't discuss is the fact that most of the law firms discussed in this article, are defense firms that bill their support staff at a fairly high hourly rate - upwards of $100 per hour, in some cases. So if I'm Acme Megacorp, and I hear that my law firm has outsourced their support staff, I'm going to expect to pay less for the support staff. If the law firms do cut the hourly billing rate, then the savings disappears, or is greatly reduced. And if the law firms don't cut the hourly rate, they may lose clients.

There's also ethical problems, too. Lawyers are supposed to closely supervise nonlawyer staff members that work on cases. With the distance and time differences, it's going to be pretty tough to supervise a staff member in India. It's not hard to imagine an unhappy client filing a suit for malpractice.

The real problem is that law firms, like too many other businesses, are focusing on saving money instead of making money.

Comments

[George]

My wife and I have worked in the airline industry for 20 and 28 years. 9-11 is being used by the big dogs in the most irehensible way. All the majors, run by ceo's that couldnt turn a profit if the load factors ran at 100% all the time..Continue to plead poverty, Then, when things are looking better they just arbitrarily give themselves bonuses....either stock or cash and guess what...Busted again. They will continue to whine about 9-11 until all the contracts are signed on the properties and all concessionary packages signed away...Then again they will dip into the till, grab whats left and all meet at Frank Lorenzo's To see whom hs the best story of putting a group out in the street...Raise fares one or two dollars...why should the traveling public have to suffer...a two buck difference on a ticket when I can screw my own employees..."Hey Frank you da man," Teach us master teach us more....Teach us how to be an airline whore."