Clients defaulting on fee payments, or not paying fees for months after raising an invoice, is a problem that all lawyers face. This is a relatively minor issue for a senior lawyer with an established practice and many clients. However, for a young lawyer, especially when trying to establish his or her independent practice, even one or two clients defaulting on fee payments might mean having to dip into savings to pay the office and house rent.
Lawyers also end up wasting significant time and effort in follow-ups and reminders to clients to clear their bills. We can use this time for productive work.
Solving this problem is a one of the central considerations of my initiative, ‘House Court’. On the House Court Platform clients pay the lawyer’s fees to the Platform in advance. The Platform holds the fees in escrow and releases it to the lawyer immediately on completion of the work. When they deliver House Court enabled services, lawyers do not need to worry about whether or not they will get paid on time for their work. Clients are also comforted by the fact that they are only paying for completed work.
Lawyers can use the time they would normally spend on getting clients to pay up, to work on their existing cases, and acquire new clients.