Here is the advertisement spam in today’s inbox:
Attorneys Get Started with Team India
Published by Actuit India on 20th January 2008
Hire Bankruptcy Petition Preparation Services
Since 2008 Actuit has a disciplined team of paralegals to help your bankrutpcy practices. Our digital outsourcing process make sure that team is efficient with your time and you get the best of the outsourcing experience. We make sure that you get benefited from the highest quality system design we have to offer. So that each new client experiences the best that our offshore expert paralegal has to offer
We do limit the number of clients handled by each team.
Save time to manage your bankruptcy practice, spend less & watch your practice grow while we work as your paralegal back office form New Delhi, India.
Is that how you want your bankruptcy case prepared? Do you want your most personal financial information stored on computers located in India or China?
There is a lot of economic incentive for lawyers to outsource this service:
- Outsourcing removes the number one overhead cost of most law firms: employee wages.
- Outsourcing transforms paralegal costs from a fixed overhead item to a variable cost expense.
- Outsourcing means you need less office space, so you save on rent.
- Paralegals in India do not receive overtime.
- Payroll tax burdens are eliminated with overseas outsourcing. It eliminates the need to file quarterly reports with the IRS.
- The burden of hiring and firing is eliminated.
I’ve never outsourced my paralegal staff. I doubt I ever will. Why not?
For starters, I have found the cost savings illusory. Sure, I can outsource the labor cost of preparing a bankruptcy petition for maybe $100 to $150 per case. But outsourcing has many drawbacks.
- Quality Suffers. Workers in India simply do not understand life in America (and we don’t fully understand their life either). When you don’t understand your client fully, how are you to ask the client questions to fully explain their financial situation to the court? Paralegals from India are probably fine technicians, but they don’t get the culture and they do not have the experience to explain and document my client’s financial situation.
- Communication Problems. I believe that one attorney and one paralegal should be assigned to each client. You speak to the same team every time you call our office. You know your attorney/paralegal team and they know you. They know your kids names and your favorite football team and a million other details about your family. Bankruptcy cases can last for up to 5 years. That’s an important relationship. Because we know you better we can serve you better. Do you think a worker from India can match that?
- Cost Savings are Illusory. It may cost less to outsource case preparation, but knowledgeable workers save money in other ways. By providing one-on-one interaction with clients, they perform their job better and that leads to more client referrals. They do their job more efficiently because they have a fuller understanding of the client’s background.
- Protecting Confidential Client Information. Bankruptcy attorneys gather a lot of personal information, including tax returns, paycheck stubs, bank account statements, retirement statements, etc. You want that information stored on some computer in India?
It’s one thing to have a car part or a computer chip manufactured overseas. As a consumer I benefit from the cost savings. But when it comes to legal services, the push to outsource work is inherently risky. When I hire a local attorney I don’t want my file sent overseas.
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Image courtesy of Flickr and Juan Antonio F. Segal