If you have been billed by an attorney before, with a blow by blow accounting of every single minute spent, then you understand why attorneys account for every single MINUTE. It's because a minute may amount to over $4.00, so not charging for 5 minutes may mean "losing" $20 bucks!! God forbid the attorney should be losing $20bucks!
Attorney herein does charge by the hour, but does not do the nickel and dime method. It's just too much work to count it all with a timer... attorney already knows that she will work harder than nearly any other attorney for several reasons...for starters, attorney has a social work degree. NOT a business law degree. Attorney did not go to school to become rich. Make a living yes. Rich, no.
Then we have the justice factor. Attorney does not like losing, and especially when the case clearly indicates the client should not be losing, and especially when it's about kids. Or bad legal rulings. Or maybe judge just hates your client. Or maybe client hates judge. Doesn't matter--in every case there is a way that is better than other ways. My job is to determine that strategy and I do it. It won't matter how long it takes if it's possible. I am always shocked at the methods used by some attorneys who seem to care less about what they are doing (meaning they appear to take a losing proposition and stick with it..or they will be highly egregious in their approach...)...but that's fine with me. They may keep billing their clients even if their clients lose.
That's very common from what I have seen locally. In fact we even heard attorneys talking outside that they would just keep the case going to raise the billing hours!! How sad is that?
Attorney herein believes that family law is handled very differently than other areas of law. Yes, attorney knows about other areas of law (criminal, civil, animal, bankruptcy,etc.) and has done cases in those areas. Family law and animal law have the high/low emotional toll on people, but attorney is used to this. Just about every non imaginable thing out there, attorney has probably already seen it. Not a joke.
So attorney isn't surprised by very much, unless it's another attorney trying to denigrate this attorney inappropriately. At that point, better watch out, because attorney herein doesn't put up with BS. Period. Just calling it like it is. If you need down to earth real help, and you want someone who is not afraid to call a spade a spade, then I might be a good match for your case. I don't play games, I won't tolerate BS, and I can't stand fake people. Let's just say I win most of the time.
*If you have a case that cannot be won (in my opinion) I would suggest you seek other opinions, but in most cases, I am right. In part this is because I have been out in the field a long time, and also because I have been to every court in San Diego county--North County, East County, downtown, and Chula Vista... [juvenile court excepted] and have handled cases against very large entities such as Chase Bank, PGE, the State of CA, the American Kennel Club, and government entities.