Cost-Crunching Counsel: Nine Keys to Controlling Costs and Improving Legal Services for Your Business
By Dan Harris

Attorneys are all about money, right?

We’re the ones who cue our families for photographs with, “Everybody smile and say, ‘Fees!’” Go ahead. Insert your own joke here. We can take it. But despite the jokes and our reputation, most of us are businessmen, too. We understand the need to control costs. We don’t like wasting anyone’s time, either.

We’re just like you. We thrive on referrals and return business. If we gouge clients, a lot of people hear about it.

So I’m here, as an attorney, to tell you how to keep your legal costs under control. I’ve enjoyed twenty years in my career with firms ranging in size from more than 500 lawyers to firms with less than five attorneys. It’s this simple: When companies follow these nine keys for hiring and using legal counsel, they crunch their legal costs—and actually increase the quality of their legal representation.

Key #1. Get the right lawyer for the job.

Get the lawyer whose practice focuses on the narrow area of law in which you need assistance. (This almost always means you need more than one law firm doing your legal work, by the way.)

Choosing the right lawyer can save you big money in the long run. The focus of my practice is international dispute resolution. Many times, the best way to collect a debt owed by a foreign company (particularly if that company is based in an emerging market country) is to seize an asset of that company in a foreign country. Suing these companies in the United States is very expensive. Many countries do not fully recognize U.S. judgments. You sue here and take the judgment there, only to learn you essentially need to sue again and win in your debtor company’s home country. Seizing your debtor’s valuable asset in a neutral third country can oftentimes be the best solution.

The problem is that many, if not most, of the contracts my clients or their attorneys ask me to collect on outside of the United States weren’t written with that in mind. Why not? Because they weren’t written by an international lawyer. In these cases, I’m only brought in as the specialist to do damage control long after the agreement is executed. Many of these contracts state very explicitly that the client’s home city is the only jurisdiction in which any lawsuit might be brought. So what happens? Such a provision can preclude action in some foreign countries and make seizure in all of them more problematic.

I had a recent case where I am certain we could have collected a million dollars for the client in an overseas jurisdiction had there not been a provision requiring litigation in an East Coast state. My East Coast client may have saved a few hundred dollars by having his regular lawyer draft the contract, but in the end, it may have cost them a million dollars.

Choosing the specialist usually saves money in the short term as well. My next door neighbor asked me to be her lawyer in purchasing a house from her parents. (A reminder: I do international dispute resolution.) I made clear I had absolutely no real estate background and that this transfer would be far more complicated than she probably realized.

My neighbor needed an attorney with experience in these deals. I knew such a deal should be structured to legally minimize various taxes and I told her that if she used someone without experience in this specific area—like me—she increased the likelihood of missing out on some tax benefit. Still, the clincher was when I told her that it would take someone like me around 30 hours to do such a project, while someone who was familiar with the legal territory would probably get it done in half the time.

I recommended a top-flight real estate lawyer with a tax background and told my neighbor she should expect legal fees of at least $3,500. She mentioned that the lawyer I’d recommended had completed the job, tax benefits intact, for much less.

I was shocked by the low fees and called the real estate lawyer for an explanation (I actually thought he had cut my neighbor a break as a favor to me). The lawyer told me it had taken him only three hours for the job because he does about twenty of these transactions a year. That means there is no need for him to research the tax laws each time so what would take me 30 hours takes him three.

This illustrates an old adage about the best way to find the best lawyer for your particular matter: solicit suggestions from your regular lawyer, or a friend who is an attorney. However, you need to ask for more than, for example, someone who has ever done a trademark registration. In that case, you’ll probably be passed off to another lawyer in his firm that has handled a few trademarks rather than getting the name of a well-respected trademark lawyer outside the firm. Using the in-firm corporate generalist for your trademark work will prove mighty expensive if that generalist misses something in the registration.

By Andrew Bicknell

In the past doing a Texas criminal records background check would take time, patience, and in some cases a little bit of money. Fortunately this is no longer the case as it is now possible to use internet criminal record search sites to do the work in less time for a fraction of the cost.

The records that you will gain access to are all part of the public record which makes them available to anyone who wants them. These records, while freely available, used to be hard to find just for the fact that they were kept on microfiche or files in folders at different government agencies or the court houses in which the person was processed. Over time they have been moved to computerized databases that are becoming more readily available online.

In many cases all you will need is the persons first and last name and state of residence. The types of records you will have access to include court records, current and past arrest warrant reports, marriage and divorce records, birth information, property taxes and liens, sex offenses, driving records, and aliases the person may have used.

There are cases where all the information that applies to a criminal case is not revealed because of the different privacy laws that exist at the federal and state level. Because some of this information is of a sensitive nature, such as witness names and statements, it is kept hidden from public view. This does not affect the fact that if someone has a criminal record it will show up in a background check. These privacy laws simply protect those who need to be protected because of someone else's criminal activities.

If you choose to use one of the nationwide databases to check on someone\'s criminal record in the state of Texas you can rest assured that you will remain anonymous. No one will know that you have checked up on them unless you present them the evidence of their past activities.

As these Texas criminal records databases become more and more complete the information you are looking for can be found quickly and easily. This will give you a good idea about certain peoples backgrounds and whether or not they would make a good employee or be someone you trust in your home and around your family.

To learn more about Texas state background checks and to start your Texas Criminal Records Search Click Here

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