Last year a flippant e-mail exchange between lawyers discussing a client’s mounting legal fees surfaced in court papers submitted as part of a fee dispute between the client and the law firm. The lawyers worked for one of the world’s largest law firms and the offending e-mail stated: “That bill shall know no limits.”
The law firm in question has since denied that overbilling took place and described the e-mails as “an unfortunate attempt at humor by three former lawyers of the firm”. However, apart from resulting in a public relations nightmare for the firm, this is one of several cases that have once again thrown the international spotlight on legal fees charged by commercial lawyers.