From Hours to Minutes: How Smart Firms Turn Time Savings into Profit

One firm’s story shows how document automation can deliver client value and higher returns—all in less time.

For most lawyers, time is the currency of their work. Billable hours, flat fees, and client deadlines all revolve around it. But what if saving time didn’t just ease your workload—what if it actually made your firm more profitable?

That’s exactly what happened for one boutique firm when they adopted Doxserá®, a document automation tool that works directly inside Microsoft Word.

From Six Hours to 40 Minutes

The firm had long offered a flat fee of $2,500 for a frequently requested banking matter—one that typically took six hours to prepare, review, and finalize. After implementing Doxserá®:

The same work took just 40 minutes They reduced their flat fee to $1,800, a win for their clients Their blended hourly return soared from $416/hour to over $2,700/hour This wasn’t just about speed. It was about leveraging automation to do high-quality legal work in less time, then passing part of the savings to clients while keeping the lion’s share of the gain.

The Power of Gross Margin

Here’s a concept more law firms should embrace: gross margin—the difference between what a firm charges and what it costs to deliver a service.

Let’s break it down:

A mid-level attorney might cost a firm $135/hour (after salary, benefits, and overhead)

That same time might bill at $300/hour

The firm’s gross margin? About $165/hour

So when automation saves 5 hours per matter, that’s more than just convenience—it’s $825 in pure margin regained. Better yet, if those hours are redeployed to other billable work, the firm has effectively expanded its revenue capacity without hiring.

⚖️ A Lawyer’s Edge in a Flat-Fee World

Flat-fee billing has grown in popularity, but it puts pressure on firms to increase efficiency while maintaining quality. Document automation allows firms to:

• • Standardize their work
  • Reduce human error
  • Deliver faster turnarounds
  • Increase profitability per engagement

Or put more simply: it gives lawyers a business edge.

✅ Takeaway

Whether your firm bills by the hour or offers fixed fees, time saved is value created. The question is—who captures that value: you or the clock?

With tools like Doxserá^®, smart firms are rewriting that answer every day. See how in the KB.