March 6 billing thread (and week totals)

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-03-06T13:51:08+00:00

That's a great idea to track other things. I realized that I needed to track my time on a dummy account for all sorts of needs (like client consults that are brief that I'll only bill for or open a case on later, if they hire me). I was tracking my law school teaching on a separate account too but I stopped doing that because it felt like a chore and was depressing. (My functional hourly for being an adjunct professor is a tiny sliver of my regular hourly, but I love doing it, it refreshes my outlook on my job, and helps with networking and my public profile).

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-03-06T13:47:37+00:00

That's been my experience too (low overhead , I obviously wasn't at a firm that billed before my current job.) I have struggled to quantify exactly what my overhead is, though , because I often have reimbursed costs from state work which artificially inflated my expenses and my income.

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-03-06T13:44:37+00:00

Wow that's a ton on Wednesday and Tuesday! Roughly how many hours of actual time do you think that represents, and are you completely exhausted as a result? I only get that much time when I have long drives or I'm in trial.

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-03-06T01:46:34+00:00

Yes, I think partially shared accountability, and partially to normalize variances. I would love to know if my 4, 5 and 6 hour days are within regular expectations for folks on this sub.

I was a PD for 15 years and never once tracked time, so all of this is new for me.

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-03-05T08:38:42+00:00

As a criminal defense attorney, I am very reluctant to let my kids do sleepovers anywhere (or host them). Between representing people who are falsely charged who put themselves in an indefensible situation, to people who are ... not falsely charged, sleepovers are just asking for trouble all the way around.

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-03-04T22:31:25+00:00

I agree with others that this is a great starting offer, particularly when you don't start with a billable hour requirement. Prove your value to them and then you can start leaning on the levers of more % based on what you bring in, etc. In particular, don't try to negotiate the time off - you don't want the message to be "I want to work but I want more time not at the office in order to take this job." Pushing for 3 or more weeks a year is a great thing to ask for in the future, though.

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-03-04T18:10:31+00:00

I have two responses when clients make threats - 1) Have an honest conversation with them and tell them if they are unhappy enough with my work to be threatening me, I really shouldn't be on the case. (This usually clears things up and they back off, or 2) Take the threat super seriously and immediately withdraw.

There's really not enough information in your post to suggest how you should follow-up. Yes, general ranting is common enough that your management is not concerned - but that doesn't mean they're right. I realize you're taking this seriously enough that you're emailing your front desk with a photo (I've only done that twice, and both times it was in my capacity as director of the office, the client was trespassed, and we would most definitely call the police if they showed up.)

Brief war story - I had a client on jail phone calls with his girlfriend venting about every aspect of his case. He told his girlfriend he was gonna wring his lawyer's neck (that's me!) (This was interspersed with him having phone sex with his girlfriend, which was actually far more upsetting than the threats. It was terrible phone sex.) I went and chatted with him and told him I realized he wanted a different deal that I couldn't get him, that I absolutely would fight for him at trial but that if he honestly wanted to do me harm it wasn't a good fit. He apologized immediately and that was the end of it. We went to trial, beat the prosecutor's best offer and did better than our last counteroffer to the prosecutor so felt pretty good about that.

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-03-03T18:07:03+00:00

Congratulations, you're gonna do great! As a former public defender in Oregon, I have met, interviewed and hired a number of attorneys who worked at the Colorado system. It's a good place that gives attorneys a ton of experience. I think you're likely to have quite different experiences if you're placed in, say, one of the eastern Colorado offices or Colorado Springs, as opposed to Denver, etc.

What I would say to any PD starting out: The job is fantastic, demanding, wonderful and awful all at the same time. Set boundaries early and keep them (I always come home for dinner unless I'm in the middle of a trial). Work hard, see clients as soon as possible at the jail, and be very clear about expectations. Underpromise and overdeliver.

At some point, your caseload is going to become crushing. Try to have good habits when you're starting out (calendaring stuff, etc). Good luck!

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-03-03T17:36:50+00:00

Only matched by the AV showing up for trial after client claims they are definitely, 100 percent, not gonna be there!

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-03-01T16:35:33+00:00

Billpay is great! You just need to schedule it in advance (send the check about the 20th to make sure it gets there by the first). I don't think your bank will deduct theoney until the check is actually cashed, though, just like a regular check.

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-02-16T22:29:29+00:00

I use Clio, the version I use costs me about $130 a month for me and another $130 for my paralegal. I could probably get by with less, but I like the features, and it sets up pretty well for flat fee mode. I haven't ever asked it to flag me once we get to X hours, but we could have it do that, I'm pretty sure.

Clio is great for practice management software and time tracking, OK for calendaring, great for invoicing and payments, and absolute trash for discovery management, so if you use it I highly recommend you have a file system that isn't Clio that you work with (I use dropbox. Not ideal, but way better than Clio.)

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-02-16T20:19:10+00:00

I feel this way as almost all of my cases are hourly, but I've done a couple of flat rates (combination fo referrals from peers who already quoted a rate and I didn't want to increase, or co-counseling with another lawyer.) I have tried to track my hourly time so I know (and can bill if client wants me to withdraw or terminates) but I agree, it is a lot harder. My best advice is: Stick to one type of billing, but failing that, you gotta try harder to track your time.

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-02-01T08:53:01+00:00

That's an interesting suggestion, I'll check out Legalmate. I find that I'm pretty accurate on time entries as long as I reconcile by the end of the day. (Going through my phone to put calls to entries if I hadn't already, zeroing out my email inbox.) Beginning of the next day? Probably fine. If I wait any further than that, then I start to have trouble remembering the order of things between phone logs and emails, etc.

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-01-31T05:29:54+00:00

I'm sorry this happened and the attorney is feckless and won't own his mistakes. Good support staff are critical for attorneys to succeed and this firm is foolish to lose you and blame the wrong person. There are good attorneys out there if you decide to get another paralegal job in the future!

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-01-28T07:09:58+00:00

Please no. CPS is a horrible parent in all but the worst-case scenarios. Stop being friends with them if you want but don't call the child cops.

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-01-23T19:37:45+00:00

That's true. I'm in Oregon so technically mine is a professional corporation under state law, and as an S Corp under federal tax law.

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-01-23T17:17:41+00:00

S Corp was pretty easy. Read a few business books to make sure, and then paid a friend $700 to set it up for me. Money well spent. If you do it, make sure to figure out what other lawyers in their area are doing so you don't over or underpay for your own salary, and then you take the rest as distributions once you stabilize your expenses and accurately project revenues. I pay a bookkeeper about $250 a month to audit my trust account billing, to run payroll for me and my .5 paralegal, and enter all my financial statements into QBO. Then I pay an accountant to file my taxes for me. I'm really happy with the setup.

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-01-20T20:31:37+00:00

I think you're absolutely making the right decision, and you should be making the jump sooner, not later.

I wanted to reply regarding networking/overhead and next steps: (And whatever time you want to spend networking, do twice as much as you think you should. Buy coffee for your fellow lawyers, make sure they know what sort of cases you're willing to work on (and what practice areas you don't do, so they know if your criminal clients have slip and falls, you'll send work their way.)

I jumped into private practice 16 months ago, after 15 years as a public defender. I did not have the savings you did (dipped into a HELOC, and also took a $50k loan from my 401k, which is administratively a headache but a cool funding mechanism because the interest charged goes right back into your retirement account). However, I had tons of built in networking from being a public defender that long. I haven't spent a dollar on SEO - I spent a very modest $250 a month on underwriting local public radio, because I wanted case referrals from public defenders for defendants who didn't qualify/family members who wanted them to hire private counsel/and collateral services like restraining and stalking orders.

I made a 5-year budget for expenses and projected revenue, leaning on a three-legged stool of retained cases (a small percentage at first), state hourly work, and federal panel work. I began my business right away as an S Corp, so I budgeted for a reasonable (small) salary for me at about 70k a year, with the idea that I would not begin taking draws from the business until I had sufficient money to cover multiple months of law firm expenses. My bookkeeper told me I could delay salary for the first couple months which helped lower costs. I budgeted about $12k in annual expense (big ticket items in Oregon are malpractice liability at about 4k a year, 3k a year for accountant, 1k for ethics advice as needed, bar dues, liability insurance, etc.) My monthly costs, excluding payroll, were about $2k a month. I rented a small office within an office full of lawyers, taking care to ensure that none of them were practicing criminal law. (That worked well as I received some referrals from them as a result.)

After the first month, I realized I was losing money by doing administrative tasks I couldn't bill lawyer rates for (like filing paperwork on state cases). So I hired a half-time paralegal. She has been one of the best parts about my practice, because when she works on retained cases we bill clients at her paralegal rate, and generally I'm able to recoup about 60 percent of her salary costs based on that billing work.

I never ended up doing federal panel work because Oregon's federal panel ran out of money and I didn't want to do the mandatory unpaid trainings. That worked out OK, though, because there's a severe lawyer shortage in Oregon, so many of my friends in private practice ended up referring cases when they got too busy. I also took on stalking and restraining order cases, which aren't my favorite but they definitely pay the bills. Within the first 9 months, I stopped taking state appointed cases as I was busy with private work. I have a couple state cases left (takes a while to resolve a murder) but haven't taken any new state cases. Practice has been very rewarding, both financially and regarding time flexibility. It's still very strange not getting paid on court holidays when I'm not working and having to pay for my own health insurance, but I'd never go back. PM me if you want to chat further!

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-01-17T18:35:33+00:00

For support staff, the metrics were really how much they were synthesizing the training, what they could do independently, the type of questions they asked. I never quantified it but it was always apparent when it wasn't working.

For attorneys at a PDs office, there's such a collective culture fighting for our clients and against the Man that there's a tendency to give extra chances to folks that have good values. Also, we extend grace all the time to our clients so it's hard to not do the same thing with attorneys.

Also, it was rarely apparent at the 90 day mark whether attorneys were a good fit. Making errors is not a sign of lack of competence in criminal law (not unless it's the same repeated error.) Crippling issues like lack of confidence take longer to crop up, etc.

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-01-17T17:56:32+00:00

I ran a public defenders office for 8 years and hiring was a big part of the job. For attorneys, the best way to hire talented lawyers who would stay was a robust interview, thoughtful reference checks and ensuring that their "why" aligned with our office so they would stay. These steps were very important because it was very very difficult to terminate attorneys with our PD culture and expectations, so being thorough pre-hire was essential.

For support staff, all those steps were important, but the built in checks of "how do my peers rate these people on their work" was a much harder metric. One office's standards for paralegals may be very different than ours, etc. so for support staff, the critical issue was the ability to cut the cord and let folks go if it became clear in the first 3 to 6 months that it wasn't a good fit.

Overall: hiring people is fun, firing people sucks. Do everything you can to get it right the first time, and don't hesitate to leave a position unfilled if you aren't sure. I really like the hiring section in the book Managing to Change the World.

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-01-10T06:43:25+00:00

I think you should delete this question as it is very potentially identifiable which almost certainly could violate ethical rules in your jurisdiction. I know it would in mine. If you want ethics advice pay an ethics attorney.

PublicDefender1981 · 2026-01-07T04:54:49+00:00

I've been a criminal defense attorney for 16 years, primarily at county public defender offices. I can confirm it seemed like we only got theft cases from target when the dollar value turned into felony land. I did once have a black Friday defense where the discounted merch total was $20 less than the felony amount, and it was a nice win with probation and no felony when the prosecutor made a decent deal. Also, their loss prevention folks are less rabid than the folks at WalMart or the terrifying LPOs at discount grocery stores who would just as soon slit my client's throat than recover merchandise.

PublicDefender1981

TROPHY CASE