Bostina: Clients no longer willing to pay lawyers “by the hour”

Lawyer Doru Bostina, founder of Bostina si Asociatii law firm, a major player on the legal services market, says firms are using the crisis as an "excuse" to ask for lower fees. And most of the times they've benefited from such fees.

"Romania is not a market where lawyers' fees are comparable with Anglo-Saxon ones, of 300-500 euros per partner. This is not the case, with only 2, 3 clients able to pay these sums. Clients are so different that during this period such an approach as 'this is my rate' is this' has no relevance. Clients no longer ask for fees by the hour, but directly say: 'This is my budget. Can you work with it or not?'," says Doru Bostina, who considers such an approach compels lawyers to be more efficient. Bostina posted a lower than 5% drop of revenues for the Bucharest office, to 10.6m euros, but says that overall, the firm's revenues amounted to 17m euros including offices in Romania and abroad.

One of the firm's major moves this year is relocation to new offices that entailed investments of 5m euros. "For 2010, we are moderately optimistic, planning to cement our position on the market and open two territorial offices, in Bacau and in another city (...)," Bostina says.