Gathering of lawyers reveals communication concerns
January 08, 2008
A meeting between top lawyers and business people has discussed how relationships between solicitors and clients currently stand, the Times reports.
The exclusive London breakfast, hosted by legal headhunter Dominique Graham, was attended by representatives from Goldman Sachs and Unilever, among other top firms.
Delegates agreed that lawyers and corporate clients needed to show more mutual understanding - a move which could lead to fewer cases of alleged solicitor negligence, which can prove very costly for businesses.
The high fees charged by top firms - a traditional bone of contention between the groups and the subject of many solicitor negligence claims - was also discussed, with some lawyers complaining that communication was again a problem.
"There just isn't genuine client uptake for alternative billing approaches," Peter Sharp of Dewey & LeBoeuf said.
David Cheyne at top City firm Linklaters added a personal anecdote about billing - recounting the occasion where he pre-warned a client that if they did not sign a certain set of documents by a given date, their fees would double.
"It was exactly what happened, the bill did double, and they were perfectly happy," he added.
"But if we hadn't told them that, they would have been, I think, entirely justified in saying, 'How on earth could you have done that?'"