Locke Lord Bissell swapping Lexis for Lois
As firms deal with the difficult economic environment, they’re looking for ways to cut back on costs (that don’t involve firing their associates). Kirkland got rid of the granola. K&L Gates went to one-ply toilet paper. A LittleLaw firm in Minnesota said goodbye to Kleenex.
We don’t know the status of the paper goods or bagels at Locke Lord Bissell & Liddell, but we do know the firm is cutting back on its legal research costs. A Locke Lord associate tells us the firm is embracing Loislaw for non-billable legal research:
Thanks to the faltering economy, we are now required to use Loislaw instead of Lexis or Westlaw for certain things.
Unlike its more expensive counterparts, Loislaw has one “low, all-inclusive flat rate, with no hidden charges for printing, copying, downloading, or hyperlinking to primary law or analytic materials outside the scope of a current subscription.” Loislaw will now be Locke Lord’s destination for primary legal research. To travel on to Westlaw or Lexis, a client has to be footing the bill. From the firm memo announcing the new policy:
* All non-billable legal research involving case law, statutes or regulations at both the state and federal level should first be performed using Loislaw. * Loislaw should also be used for billable research where appropriate, resulting in a much lower cost to the client. * If additional research is required on Lexis or Westlaw that research must be billed to a client/matter.
Full memo from Locke Lord on the switch to one-ply legal research, after the jump.
LOCKE LORD BISSELL & LIDDELL FIRM-WIDE MEMORANDUM
In today’s economic climate we recognize that our clients are becoming increasingly sensitive to legal research costs passed on to them as disbursements. In an effort to enable you to reduce the frequency and dollar amount of these charges, the Information Services Department has entered into a firm-wide contract with Loislaw, a legal research service owned by Wolters Kluwer/CCH. Loislaw allows searching Primary Law (cases, statutes & regulations) on the National and State level. A detailed list of the contents of the database is included at the end of this e-mail.
The Houston office has been using this service for several years for both non-billable and billable research whenever possible. It is not viewed as a substitute for Lexis or Westlaw, but as a tool to be used to familiarize yourself with precedent related to new cases or issues or simply to find cases, statutes or regulations. You can then continue your research on Lexis or Westlaw allowing you to complete your research in substantially less time and a lower cost to your client and/or the Firm. The Firm pays Loislaw a reasonable fixed fee for the year and receives unlimited service. You will have the ability to add a client/matter number when you want to bill the client, but will not be forced to do so for non-billable research
The following Guidelines for Legal Research are effective immediately.
* All non-billable legal research involving case law, statutes or regulations at both the state and federal level should first be performed using Loislaw.
* Loislaw should also be used for billable research where appropriate, resulting in a much lower cost to the client.
* If additional research is required on Lexis or Westlaw that research must be billed to a client/matter..
Training Available
Subscribers are referred to the Legal Pro site (http://business.cch.com/legalprotraining) for hands-on, web-based instruction by a Legal Training Consultants. There is also a complete training handbook available on-line at www.loislaw.com. I have attached a copy of a Quick Reference Card that should enable you to get started with searching right away. If a number of attorneys would prefer in-house training, we can arrange for that as well.
Immediate Access Available
The link to Loislaw is available on the Information Services Portal Page under Legal Research Links.
Let us know if you have any questions regarding this new service.
Sandy Gold, Chicago
Joan Hass, Dallas
Charles Gibson, Houston
(48) 
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Next post, please.
Why is ATL advertising for LoisLaw?
all these posts stink today! What the hell am I supposed to do during class?
True biglaw firms have a flat fee arrangment with Lexis and/or Westlaw. They can then choose whether to charge the client for research at a share of that flat rate, at Lexis/Westlaw's standard rates (money maker for the firm), or just write it off.
It seems today that all you see is violence in movies and sex on TV...
I heard Wachtell is making their attorneys do all of their legal research on Google.
Locke Lord is a shit factory. I am embarrassed for them.
Message to Lexis/Westlaw . . . Lower your rates or Loislaw will eat your lunch.
Hell, I already use Wikipedia for 95% of my legal research, and I have unlimited access to Westlaw and Lexis . Why bother with any legal research product at all?
I second 11, if a statute is not described on Wikipedia, with cases cited to back it up, it is not important enough to know.
Ouch. Sucks to be a Locke Lord litigator
How psyched will LLBL's clients be to pay LLBL's associates to learn to use a slower and less comprehensive system?
I like it. Firms need to start shifting some paradigms and revolutionize outside the box, 80's style.
What in Sam Hill is a "Loislaw"?
80s guy, you continue to be my absolute favorite character on these comment threads. I think i laugh out loud at half your stuff.
4 nailed it. This is one giant advertisement for a legal research tool (used by tools) that none of us has ever heard of.
Did they pay you to post this? If so, please disclaim. If not, get on that, duh.
Funny how the entire time I was at biglaw all I ever did was look for law that said what the partner wanted it to say. I was repeatedly told to find every case on some topic and then yelled at for billing 16 hours. Too much money and time are wasted on Lexis and Westlaw.
Billy Mays here for LOISLAW!
FOR JUST ONE LOW FLAT RATE OF $9.99 a month plus S+H you can enjoy all of the legal research that you want.
I'm a V15 3rd year who has gotten by without ever touching Westlaw or Lexis at all on my job thus far. Is that bad or ok?
16--damn straight. This is the first time I've ever heard of Loislaw.
16, 22 - I'm with you. ... What I picture is Kramer doing MoviePhone, except its someone named Lois.
22 here, 23. I was actually thinking it involved Lois Lane?
22 here, 23. I was actually thinking it involved Lois Lane?
But 23's idea is pretty good. "Please tell me the case you want to research."
You use Lexis or Westlaw b/c you need to KeyCite or Shepardize the authority upon which you rely!!!!
What happens when you have to do research for a partner's NON-billable project, such as an article or presentation? Maybe LLB doesn't hand out non-billable work to associates...
LoisLaw LOL
Ok, LoisLaw is a joke for now, but only because we are fed the doctrine of WestLaw/Lexis the way we were fed the doctrine of Nike and Reebok in middle school.
There is an EXCELLENT market opportunity for "generic" legal research tools. Ones that don't pay students to stand in every law school, offer free prizes for points like Kool-Aid, and shuttle lawyers as "research assistants" to all the major firms (to make sure you are still on the sauce).
The real joke is that case law is not publicly available in the first place like, say, the EU ....
see at:
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/en/index.htm
locke lord blow me
ahahahahahahahahaha.
acquire a firm, drop lexis.
Deflation comes to legal research. Next stop: associate pay.
In all seriousness, I've gotten by with LoisLaw for over a year now. It seems to catch lots of cases before Westlaw and Lexis.
This sucks. They need to negotiate a flat rate or just write it off.
I work in a BigLaw firm and Loislaw is actually not bad. It's actually pretty effective for the initial scattershot research that most associates do when first starting a project. Once you've identified the key case(s) or buzzwords for the topic, then it's more efficient to move to Westlaw/Lexis to do more advanced research. But Loislaw is a great tool for the initial searches - much better than searching ALLCASES on Westlaw for hundreds of dollars a search.
Read somre EU business news, wolters (LoisLaw's parent) is probably looking to merge(Reed or Bloomberg), LoisLaw will be another victim of the credit meltdown.
what's a locke lord?
You must be a REAL loser if you would rather go back to law school than high school. High school was more fun and less work. You also had your entire future ahead of you. In law school, you are pretty much locked in to a boring and possibly dead-end career.
Plus, you read so much as a lawyer that your face actually starts to sag.
I've always wondered why people value excessive money over health, and then I slap myself in the head for actually doing it myself. I woke up after a couple of years and realized that I had lost my true identity. Now I'm looking to get out.
Does anyone else here think that law sucks the life out of you?
How about the partners? Was it worth it? How is life just as a partner, regardless of the work it took to get to that level? You still have high billable hour requirements, so it can't be that great. But let me know.
19 - Exactly! So many clients are refusing to pay for legal research now and who can blame them? The same research is completed over and over again for different clients and firms have been attempting to charge each client. Over in the UK my colleagues use Practical Law Company and I have no doubt we'll all be using the US services over here soon enough.
29 - someone has just realized that opportunity http://us.practicallaw.com/home.do.
MORGAN & FINNEGAN which has "merged" with Lord Lock and whatever has frozen the account that laid off employees can draw their severance checks from.
Every Locke Lord associate who billed more than 1700 hours last year received a raise based on the 2008 grid. Would a Lexis search tell me how many other firms can say that?
"They can then choose whether to charge the client for research at a share of that flat rate, at Lexis/Westlaw's standard rates (money maker for the firm)..."
This practice is not permitted according to ABA ethics rules.
"They can then choose whether to charge the client for research at a share of that flat rate, at Lexis/Westlaw's standard rates (money maker for the firm)..."
ABA ethics opinions caution against markups.
I laughed too -- really? LoisLaw? -- but I am totally expecting this thing to eat Lexis's lunch. The rent Lexis and Westlaw charge for basically running glorified text searches on public documents is obscene, and they will be the first against the wall come the revolution.
But did they really have to name it LoisLaw? Roflcopter.
The cluelessness of people here (inculde the OP) doesn't cease to amaze me. Lexis (lexisone.com) and Westlaw (?) have had free case law for a while. WK is not offering anything better.
The cluelessness of people here (inculde the OP) doesn't cease to amaze me. Lexis (lexisone.com) and Westlaw (?) have had free case law for a while. WK is not offering anything better.
Since Locke Lord has no more minorities left to discriminate against and run off, I guess Neil Dickson's first order of business as Managing Partner (ATL) was to change from Lexis to Lois. I'm so NOT impressed. What a goof-ball he is???!!!