Electronic Timesheets and Time Tracking

Pop Quiz!

Ever wonder what the top pay-rate of a lawyer is? The maximum amount a lawyer can be paid in a year?

Well most lawyers bill in whole minute intervals for their time tracking, which can vary from 6 minutes upwards. What this means is that if you telephone your lawyer and speak for 30 seconds, you will be charged for 1 whole unit of time.

Historically, where did this come from?

Years ago, when ledgers were first used to track time for time and billing requirements, the time required to make a single entry would have been in minutes, and the savvy lawyers and accountants of this world soon recognized they were spending more time recording time than doing work. So time was metered in whole minute intervals.

Of course with modern technology, such as MetriQ's automated time capture software, such aggressive rounding is no longer required or needed - but non-the-less the practice continues.

So, what is the maximum pay-rate of a lawyer?

Let’s do the math. Take a top notch professional who charges out $500 per hour and uses a 15 minute billable charge-rate. We’ll assume this person works an 8 hour day, 5 days a week, 248 days a year.

Because we are working in whole units, our theoretical maximum is the number of available working seconds, multiplied by $500/4. Total is $4,464,000,000 per year.

Of course every lawyer will argue they don’t get paid this much.