Our Fee Philosophy: Predictable Legal Costs, Without the Big-Firm Team
Legal fees have a deserved reputation for unpredictability. The cause is rarely dishonesty. It is structure. Most firms sell time, in six-minute units, recorded by as many lawyers as the firm can justifiably put on your file. The final bill is whatever that process produces.
Astris Law is built differently. One senior lawyer runs your matter end to end, and wherever the scope of work can be defined, we price it before we start. This page explains how we charge, when fixed fees beat hourly rates and when they don't and why a single-lawyer model means every dollar you spend buys legal judgment, not firm structure.
We are rarely the cheapest quote you will get. We are the one where the number means something.
For market-wide figures, including hourly rates by seniority, typical fixed-fee ranges and litigation budgets across Brisbane firms, see our guide on how much a commercial lawyer costs in Brisbane.
Fixed Fees vs Hourly Rates: An Honest Comparison
Neither structure is inherently fairer. They allocate risk differently. Under hourly billing, you carry the risk of the work taking longer than expected. Under a fixed fee, the lawyer carries it. The right structure depends on how well the work can be scoped at the outset.
Hourly billing
Transparent in one sense, you see what was done and how long it took, but unpredictable, because the total depends on how the matter unfolds and how many people touch the file. Hourly billing rewards time spent, not problems solved, and it puts the budget risk entirely on the client.
It remains the right choice where the scope cannot be known in advance, contested litigation being the obvious example, provided it is paired with a realistic estimate, staged budgets and early warning when anything changes.
Fixed fees
A binding price for a defined scope, agreed before work begins. You can budget for it, compare it against the value of the work and approve it like any other business expense. The lawyer absorbs the risk of the work taking longer, which also creates the right incentive: efficiency benefits the lawyer rather than eroding their fee.
Fixed fees suit defined-scope work: contract drafting and review, company and shareholder structuring, employment document suites, demand letters and standard commercial agreements. Most advisory work a business needs falls in this category.
Our default is simple. If the scope can be defined, we fix the price. Where it cannot, we give a genuine estimate broken into stages, and we tell you before anything changes, not after. Both approaches are documented in a costs agreement as required by the Legal Profession Act 2007 (Qld).
A warning on fixed fees in disputes. No lawyer can price a defended proceeding as one number on day one, because the cost depends on decisions the other side has not made yet. A flat quote for contested litigation is not transparency. It is a guess, padded to cover the unknown, and one of you will pay for the guess. What can be fixed is each stage, and that is what we do.
The Single-Lawyer Model: Where Wasted Billable Hours Come From
Large firms run a leverage model: a partner supervises a pyramid of salaried lawyers, and the firm's economics depend on each of them recording billable time on your matter. Much of that time is real work. Some of it is structural waste that exists only because of how the team is organised - and on an hourly model, you pay for all of it.
The recurring categories of waste in a leveraged team:
Duplicated reading. Every lawyer added to the matter bills time getting across the same background, correspondence and documents.
Internal conferences. Team members briefing each other, in six-minute units, about work you have already paid for once.
The training subsidy. Junior lawyers learning on your file, with their drafts then rewritten by the senior lawyer whose time you are also billed for.
Handovers. When staff rotate, leave or are reassigned, the incoming lawyer re-reads the file at your expense.
Seniority mismatch. Routine work billed at partner rates, or complex judgment calls attempted at junior rates and corrected later.
A single-lawyer model eliminates these categories rather than discounting them. At Astris Law, the senior lawyer you meet on day one is the lawyer who drafts your documents, runs your negotiation and appears in your dispute. Nothing is handed over, so nothing is re-read. There are no internal meetings to bill, no junior drafts to rewrite and no pyramid to feed. The same continuity compounds over time: a lawyer who already knows your business does not bill you to relearn it at the start of every new matter.
The honest limits matter too. A single lawyer cannot field a twelve-person deal team and is not the right fit for a $100 million transaction with simultaneous tax, competition and IP workstreams. Equally, if your matter is a templated document and price is your only criterion, an online fixed-fee provider may serve you well. Our clients engage us when the answer matters more than the document.
For the legal work that owner-managed and SME businesses actually buy, contracts, structuring, employment, regulatory issues and commercial disputes, the leverage model adds cost without adding judgment. That work is what this firm is built for, across both Astrons General Counsel (commercial advisory) and our dispute resolution and litigation practice.
How We Price Work
Three structures cover almost everything we do. We recommend the one that fits the work, and we put it in writing before we start.
Fixed fees
For defined-scope work: contract drafting and review, company formation and shareholder agreements, employment document suites, terms and conditions, demand letters. You approve a known price before work begins and the price does not move unless the scope does, in which case you decide before further costs are incurred.
Hourly with staged estimates
For litigation and open-ended matters where a fixed price would just be a padded guess. We estimate stage by stage (demand, pleadings, disclosure, mediation, trial) so you decide at each gate. Paired with a deliberate settlement offer strategy, staging also builds pressure to resolve, because under Queensland costs rules a party who unreasonably refuses a good offer can end up paying your costs. See our guide to recovering legal costs in Queensland courts.
Monthly retainer
For businesses with recurring legal needs. Typically a fixed monthly fee covering regular advisory work, contract reviews, employment questions, compliance and negotiations, scoped to how your business actually uses legal support, with a lawyer who already knows your business. It is the outsourced alternative to hiring in-house, delivered through our Astrons General Counsel practice.
What Business Legal Work Costs in Brisbane: Indicative Ranges
These are Brisbane market ranges for common defined-scope work, drawn from our full guide to what a commercial (or business) lawyer costs in Brisbane. They are what the market charges for standard versions of each engagement, not a quote and not a cap: multi-entity structures, contested negotiations and high-value or high-risk matters price above these ranges, because the price follows the scope and what is at stake. Your matter gets a written fixed price for its actual scope before work begins.
| Work | Brisbane market range (standard scope) |
|---|---|
| Contract review | $750–$2,500 |
| Commercial lease review | $1,500–$3,500 |
| Simple terms and conditions | $2,000–$4,000 |
| Employment contract suite | $2,500–$10,000 |
| Company incorporation with shareholder agreement | $3,500–$8,000 |
Ranges reflect the standard version of each engagement. Multiple entities or share classes, bespoke drafting, contested negotiation and high-value or high-risk subject matter all take work above these ranges.
Hourly rates in the Brisbane market run from $250–$400 for a junior solicitor to $600–$880 for a partner. Litigation is priced in stages rather than as a single figure: District Court matters typically cost $20,000–$80,000 in legal fees and Supreme Court matters $50,000–$200,000+, which is why we cost each stage with a decision gate before the next - see the commercial litigation roadmap for how the stages fit together.
Your Rights on Legal Costs in Queensland
Whatever firm you engage, the Legal Profession Act 2007 (Qld) gives you enforceable rights on costs. Under s 308, your lawyer must disclose in writing how fees will be calculated and provide an estimate of total costs. For matters expected to exceed $3,000 plus GST, s 309 requires a costs agreement. You are entitled to itemised bills, to be told when an estimate changes significantly and to apply for an independent costs assessment if you believe you have been overcharged.
We treat these disclosure obligations as the floor, not the standard. The test we apply to our own pricing is simpler: you should never open one of our invoices and be surprised by it.
Frequently Asked Questions About Legal Fees
Written by Jamie Nuich, Legal Practitioner Director of Astris Law
Want a price before you commit? That's how it should work.
Tell us about your matter and we'll give you a defined scope and a clear price. Fixed where it can be fixed, staged where it can't.