My Attorney Blog

Would it surprise you to learn that different contract attorneys are not always paid the same wage rate for doing the same exact work? This discrepancy holds true even for those staffed on the same project and responsible for performing the same set of duties. If you are working on a temp assignment, you could very well be earning less than what the person sitting next to you is making. Unless you are performing contract work due to some inexplicable, altruistic motivation, this should come as disturbing news. Like it or not, this is a well documented common agency practice. Not all agencies engage in this manipulative practice, but it happens much too frequently.

I Was Paid Less Than The Other Temps On the Project

When I first started doing contract work not too long ago, I was staffed on a long term project by an agency that offered me a wage rate slightly lower than the market rate of $35. Despite my initial hesitation, I took the assignment because there were promises made by the agency that the project had the potential to last a very long time. Because longevity is a valuable commodity in the temporary lawyer business, I agreed to the slight wage reduction as consideration for the opportunity to work on a longer duration project.

A few months into it, I was sitting at my computer command station with my headphones on when I casually overhead two contract attorneys discussing their document review experiences. One temp had been on the project before I came along and another had only recently joined the team. The subject of wage rate disparity came up and the newer temp mentioned that the agency was paying him a rate of $35 an hour. The older temp immediately became agitated and expressed his shock and incredulity. Apparently the older temp was only being paid $33 and had been under the impression all this time that everyone else was being compensated at the same rate. The only reason he had agreed to the pay cut was because the agency had promised a long stint.

This information disturbed me greatly. After all, I later learned, we were all DC barred and likely being billed off at the same rate. Eventually more contract attorneys joined the conversation, and we discovered that only the newer temps were being paid the slightly higher wage rate. Several of us immediately called the agency to demand an explanation. After several attempts at feigning innocence and putting the blame on the law firm, the agency agreed to bump the wage rates of those affected to the same rate as everyone else. Requests for retroactive application were rejected.

Comparatively, my story is tamer than the ones I’ve heard from some other people. One individual being staffed on a supposedly lucrative foreign language review was being paid a rate of $40 an hour. It was not until a few months into the project that she learned that her similarly situated peers were being compensated at $53.

While not legally improper, the practice of paying different wage rates is very distasteful and underhanded. While not all legal staffing agencies practice this, some do, and those that do this give the rest a bad name.

Temporary Legal Staffing Agencies Try To Limit Information To Maintain their Competitive Edge

Many legal temp agencies try to make the discussion of certain subjects taboo. Most, if not all contract attorney staffing agencies have their own boiler plate employee policies that expressly prohibit temps from discussing topics such as wage rate. The conclusion I can draw is that agencies want to adopt policies that will allow them to maintain competitive control over their temps. While they want the strategic right to offer different deals to different contract attorneys, they also want to limit key information that could cause rebellion or unrest in Temp Town.

I think these agencies must be really naive if they think they can perpetually keep their contract attorneys in the dark. You know what they say. You can fool some of the people all of the time, and you can fool all of the people some of the time, but you can’t fool all of the people all of the time.

Agencies will not be able to fully prevent contract attorneys from talking among themselves regarding subjects like compensation. If legal staffing agencies want to encourage loyalty among their contract attorneys and ensure quality of effort and work, it’s in their own interest to maintain fairness in how they treat their contract employees. There is nothing good that can come out of paying similarly situated workers differently.

I will not list names at this time, but I know many contract attorneys are already well aware of which agencies have this type of shady practice. Their tainted names are routinely circulated among those in Temp Town.

Thanksgiving, Christmas, and the winter holidays are nearly upon us. You know what that means right? Overtime!

While most people see the holidays as a time to relax and take time off to spend with family, many contract attorneys, such as myself see it as the bonus months. There will always be plenty of time to take a vacation and unwind - after the project is over. When the project is still ongoing, my commitment is to taking advantage of overtime opportunities and maxing out my available hours.

Extra Overtime For Holiday Work

Most legal staffing agencies and law firms have a policy of providing contract attorneys paid holidays. What this means is that if you come in to work on an official paid holiday such as Fourth of July or Christmas for example, you are automatically paid at the overtime rate for all hours worked that day, and all hours logged will also be applied towards the usual 40 hours for the week. Once you hit 40 hours, the usual overtime rules kick in again and you get overtime thereafter. In essence your hours worked during paid holidays are performing double duty.

I know, it sounds like I’m all about the money and like I place less importance on family time during the holidays, but you should know, there is no obligation to stay the entire day. Most agencies and firms are more lenient during those paid holidays. You can usually come in and stay for as long as you want up to the maximum allotted time to earn your automatic overtime and leave earlier than usual to be with your family. Work schedules during paid holidays are generally more flexible, and even the supervising associates are usually eager to get home soon so they frequently don’t stay the entire time.

Remember, the double bonus hours you get during paid holidays don’t come along that often. Most of them occur during the winter season so do try to take advantage. It’ll help pay for all the Nintendo Wii’s and stocking stuffers you’ll be buying when December rolls around.

Things at work have begun to get a bit too routine for me, but it happens in this business. Sometimes doing contract work in the same environment can get stale. When that happens, I guess I can always count on the project eventually coming to a conclusion and give me the opportunity to start off fresh again at a different location.

My Never Ending Project

It’s not easy to predict just when that will happen though. My current project was originally scheduled to be a 6 week project. That was back in the summer. Since that time, 5 months have passed and the project continues to be regularly extended with no end in sight.

But I really can’t complain. The hours aren’t as long as I’d like, but the working condition is overall pleasant. I just wish the project provided catering or at least reimbursed us for meals - that would make it even better. Our group of contract attorneys have gotten to know each other well and there is a relaxed, collegial atmosphere in our work room.

The associates are supposed to be present at all times to supervise us and answer questions but I think they’ve decided that we can handle things on our own. After all, we are all professional adults and don’t require hand holding to do our work diligently. When we are done with our review batches we simply sign out a new one from the review binder. When we have questions that require a second opinion, we solicit feedback and discuss among ourselves. When we feel like we need partner guidance on an important matter, we call the special bat phone and get in touch with the associates back at the firm. The system essentially runs itself without the need for associate or partner oversight.

But even ideal environments become routine and humdrum over time and eventually you hear tired grumbles from those who want the project to be over with. I wouldn’t mind a few more months though.

Unpredictable But You Get To Enjoy The Changes

When I first started doing this type of work, I had a hard time handling the lack of job security. It is true that even with full time jobs, any employment-at-will situation will never truly guarantee 100% job security, but with contract work, security is even more precarious. The very nature of contract work guarantees that it won’t last forever. Sometimes you will luck out and stay on a project for months and even years. Other times you will have the misfortune of only staying on for a week before everyone is released. I’ve adapted over the last few years and have actually embraced this regular changing of work location cycle.

Some people are really affected by the changes, but personally I get bored if I’m in the same environment for extended periods of time. One of the benefits (if you call it that) of contract attorney work is that you get to be rotated into different working environments and get to meet different types of people over the course of several projects. Over the last few years, I’ve begun to recognize some familiar faces, but I still enjoy meeting new people and seeing new firms - sort of reminds me of college or law school where every semester you changed classes and switched to a different set of students. It certainly helps to keeps things fresh in this otherwise everyday-is-the-same line of work.

Not Everyone Handles Uncertainty That Well

Some people have a hard time handling the turnover and I think one of the biggest hurdles is the occasional financial instability.

Everyone needs a steady paycheck, but particularly for those who have families to support or mortgages to pay, periods of transition between projects can be extra difficult to bear. I have neither of those things and I suspect that’s probably why I handle it better than most. I do have high monthly rent payments, but my contract attorney wages and savings easily pay them off. To survive in this type of work you need to have a lot of faith and a good saving mentality. If you tend to blow your savings on frivolous things rather than focus on paying off debt and monthly expenses, you will forever struggle with paycheck to paycheck living. When I work projects that have a lot of hours, I make the extra effort to squirrel away the bulk of it to tie me over till the next project in the event I am unable to roll seamlessly. Although I’ve been able to roll over consistently, I still continue to save, and things have worked out quite well financially.