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An attorney for your attorney's bill

Stop paying for
padded invoices.

Trim the Fee reviews your attorney's invoices for overbilling, duplicate charges, block-billing, and unnecessary work — then writes the letter that asks for a reduction. Built by a practicing attorney who's been on the other side of the bill.

Trim the Fees
Line-by-line review Editable demand letter Confidential
Audit Report
Matter 001
Firm
Redacted & Associates
Matter
Business Litigation
Estimated overbilling
−$34,280
22% of invoice
Flagged entryHrsIssueReduction
Review of documents8.2Block-billed−$2,800

What the average invoice audit uncovers

AVG. REDUCTION 22%1 IN 3 ENTRIES FLAGGEDBLOCK-BILLINGDUPLICATE CHARGESVAGUE DESCRIPTIONSUNREASONABLE RATESADMIN AS LEGAL WORKTRAVEL PADDING AVG. REDUCTION 22%1 IN 3 ENTRIES FLAGGEDBLOCK-BILLINGDUPLICATE CHARGESVAGUE DESCRIPTIONSUNREASONABLE RATESADMIN AS LEGAL WORKTRAVEL PADDING
★★★★★
"An attorney got a $156,000 bill after ten weeks of work he shouldn't have been part of. He built Trim the Fee so you never have to pay one like it."
Nicolas Castillo, Esq. — Founder

Every line, every rate, every hour.

Most people don't know what to look for on an attorney's invoice. Our AI checks every entry against industry rate data, bar-association guidance, and a proprietary database of how legal work should actually be billed.

Block-billed time entries flagged
Rate benchmarks by market and practice area
Duplicate and overlapping charges
Two lawyers doing one lawyer's work
Vague descriptions and "miscellaneous" entries
$ hr
Admin work billed at attorney rates
Trim the Fees

Padding is real. And it's costing you real money.

Hidden

You can't read a legal invoice. Most bills are a wall of 0.2-hour entries with descriptions that don't mean much to anyone outside the firm.

Expensive

Small padding adds up fast. A few inflated entries per invoice, compounded over months of litigation, can cost tens of thousands of dollars.

Unfair

Clients rarely push back. Without legal training, most people assume the bill is what it is — and that's exactly what padded invoices count on.

Four steps to a smaller bill.

Upload your invoice and a few details about your matter

No accounts, no back-and-forth. Drop in a PDF of your attorney's invoice, tell us what the matter is about and where it's venued, and we get to work. Everything is encrypted and never shared.

Intake mock
New Audit
Matter 001
Matter type
Business litigation
Contract dispute · 8 months active
Venue: Los Angeles Superior Court
Invoice uploaded
April_Invoice.pdf
24 pages · 312 line entries
Billed total: $156,420.00
FirmLead attorneyPartner rateAssociate rate
Redacted & AssociatesJ. Doe$625/hr$395/hr
StatusUploaded · analyzing
ETA~4 minutes
WHAT YOU GET
Most audits complete in under four minutes. You'll see a full line-by-line breakdown of what was flagged and why — no legal background needed.

AI cross-checks every line against what legal work should cost

You should always have an attorney check your attorney. Trim the Fee compares each entry to industry rate surveys, bar-association billing guidance, venue-specific data, and our proprietary database of how comparable matters are typically billed — then flags the ones that don't add up.

Analysis preview
Flagged this invoice
Block-billing
Rate mismatch
Duplicates
Rate vs. LA market+14%
Block-billed hrs42.6
View full report
HOW WE CHECK
Every flagged entry is tied to a specific source — ABA Model Rule, rate survey, UTBMS code, or our proprietary database of comparable matters. Nothing is flagged without a citation you can read.

Get an audit report plus an editable demand letter

You don't have to write a word. We deliver a clean PDF audit report and an editable Word/PDF demand letter addressed to your attorney, laying out the flagged entries and a specific, reasonable reduction request. Change the tone, add context, send it.

Deliverable preview
T
Trim the Fee
Your audit report is ready — 22% flagged.
9:01 AM
.docx
Demand_Letter.docx
Editable letter addressed to counsel
9:01 AM
.pdf
Audit_Report.pdf
14 pages · line-by-line findings
9:01 AM
WHAT YOU SEND
You get two files: a PDF audit report for your records, and an editable Word/PDF demand letter addressed to your attorney. Edit the tone, sign, and send — on your own timeline.

Send the letter and ask for a reduction — professionally

Most people don't know they're allowed to push back. You are. Firms expect sophisticated clients to review bills carefully. A specific, well-reasoned letter — citing specific entries and industry norms — often results in a voluntary reduction, sometimes a large one.

Letter preview
Demand letter draft
TOManaging Partner, Redacted & Associates
REInvoice dated Apr 1, 2026 — Matter 001
After review of the referenced invoice, we request the following reductions based on industry standards and applicable guidance…
Block-billed entries (12)−$8,420.00
Duplicate research (3)−$2,100.00
Admin billed as attorney time−$1,640.00
Requested reduction−$34,280.00
Trim the Fee — Next steps
Playbook for the follow-up conversation
1. Send letterToday
2. Firm response expected5–10 days
3. If they counterReply template ready
4. If they declineFee-dispute resolution
5. Document everythingAudit trail saved
WHY IT WORKS
Firms expect sophisticated clients to review their bills. A specific, well-reasoned request — citing exact entries and industry norms — is how professionals negotiate fees. The letter gives you that language.
What Trim the Fee checks

Every audit runs against the standards firms are supposed to follow

We compare your invoice to the same sources firms and insurance auditors use — plus data we've collected from thousands of real attorney invoices across practice areas.

ABA Model Rules & ethics opinions
Rule 1.5 (reasonable fees), block-billing guidance, fee-agreement norms
Market rate surveys by venue & practice area
Real Rate Report, Valeo, PACER-derived fee awards, local bar surveys
Our proprietary invoice database
Thousands of reviewed invoices across litigation, transactional, family law and more
UTBMS task & activity codes
Industry-standard task coding used in e-billing and legal-bill-review programs

Don't pay a padded bill.

Upload one invoice. Get a line-by-line audit and a demand letter you can actually send. $199, flat.

Trim the Fees

FAQs

You upload your attorney's invoice and basic matter details. Our AI reviews every line entry, compares it against industry rate data, ABA guidance, and our proprietary database, and flags entries that appear overbilled, duplicated, block-billed, or improperly charged. You get a detailed audit report and an editable demand letter ready to send to the firm.
No. Trim the Fee is a software tool, not a law firm. We do not provide legal advice or representation, and no attorney-client relationship is formed by using the service. Our reports and letters are informational, based on publicly available standards and our own data. For legal advice on your specific situation, consult a licensed attorney.
Sophisticated clients review their bills. Insurance carriers do it. Corporations do it. A professional, specific, non-emotional letter citing concrete entries and industry norms is exactly what firms are used to receiving from careful clients. Most firms respond constructively — and many grant at least a partial reduction.
It varies widely. On invoices with meaningful padding, reductions of 10–25% are common. On heavily block-billed or vaguely described invoices, reductions can be much higher. If an invoice is clean, we'll tell you that too — our job is to give you an honest read, not fabricate issues.
Most state bars offer free or low-cost fee-dispute resolution programs — a neutral panel of attorneys reviews disputed bills. We include information about the program in your state and a template request in the deliverable. Our audit report also gives you a clear record if a formal fee dispute becomes necessary.
Yes. Uploads are encrypted in transit and at rest. Your invoices and matter details are used only to run your audit and improve our anonymized benchmarking data. We never share identifying information, and you can request full deletion at any time.
No. Trim the Fee works for any matter where an attorney is billing hourly — business litigation, divorce and family matters, estate and probate, personal injury hourly engagements, criminal defense, transactional work, and more. If you have an hourly invoice, we can audit it.
Yes. We support invoices from every U.S. state and tailor rate benchmarks and fee-dispute guidance to your venue. If your matter is outside the U.S., contact us — we're adding international support.
Most single-invoice audits return within a few hours. Complex matters with large invoices or multiple billing periods may take up to 24 hours. You'll get a notification the moment your report is ready.