What comes off before it is issued
Write-downs, courtesy and the deductions nobody decided — the half hour that sets the fee and leaves no record.
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The Draft, and the Evening It Is Cut
Between the recorded hours and the issued bill sits a draft and half an hour of somebody's evening. That half hour decides more than anything else in the process.
The Discount Nobody Calls a Discount
Most reductions are made silently and described as courtesy. What the word is standing in for, and what a firm gives up by using it.
Overrun, and Who Pays for the Estimate
When work exceeds the estimate, somebody absorbs the difference. Which of three people it is gets decided by when anybody notices.
Who Decided, and Whether Anybody Did
Four kinds of deduction, distinguished by who made the decision. The fourth category is larger than most firms expect.
The Deduction Nobody Recorded
A firm counted its annual discounts, split them by who decided, and found that a fifth of the total had never been decided by anybody.
Telling the Client What Came Off
Reductions are invisible by default, which means a firm's largest expenditure on a relationship buys it nothing. Three ways to show them, and one not to.
What a Year of Write-Downs Teaches
Reductions are a diagnostic nobody reads. Five things a year of coded write-downs says about a firm, none of which is about generosity.