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I agree with the many comments above about the deskilling of our profession. It is hardly a profession at all now - what is 'professional' about scrabbling around on a file for a short cut so as to stay within a fixed costs regime that bears no resemblance whatsoever to the actual value of the work carried out for a client - sorry, I meant customer of course! That's where it all began for me, the rot, when we were told we didn't have 'clients' but 'customers'.

Our profession - sorry, industry - is one where we have to engage the grey matter to unravel some very complex issues. Therefore, surely, we should be able to sit and think about those issues a little so as to ensure we consider all relevant matters and come to a proper conclusion. Does anybody now have the time or the inclination to do so? No; instead it's do your 6 minute unit consideration because we can't afford to 'waste' any more time on this file due to fixed costs and move along. Next!

Cynical and jaded, me? Well, yes. I always thought the value of a lawyer would be his or her ability to think through a problem, but if a lawyer is not allowed the time to do so, what is the point?

I'm all for certainty on costs, and I have no objection in principle to fixed costs as long as those fixed costs reflect the work that is done. I've yet to see any table of fixed costs that does.

Right, that's me being naughty and wasting billable time on ranting over. Back to the sausage factory...