Legal Audits, Billing Guidelines, and the Independent Counsel
Abstract:
Increasingly, insurance companies are depending upon legal audits and "billing guidelines" to reduce defense costs. The audits--essentially software programs--enforce the insurer's written "billing guidelines" which format the manner in which defense counsel bill and tend to standardize, either explicitly or in practice, the amount of time which the insurer will allow for generically described legal tasks, regardless of the nature or complexity of the task actually performed or the particular lawsuit. The practice of law is thereby reduced to routine, standardized tasks performed by an average and completely fungible biller. By coupling the standardized billing guidelines with appropriate auditing software, insurers believe they can significantly reduce defense costs.
For a copy of the complete article, please contact :
Jennifer Reynolds
Marketing Director
310-785-7966
jreynolds@quislaw.com
