On September 5, 2024, Justice Crane of the New York County Commercial Division issued a decision in EXRP 14 Holdings LLC v. LS-14 Ave LLC, 2024 NY Slip Op. 33155(U), reducing a fee award because of counsel’s use of block billing, explaining:
An award of reasonable attorneys’ fees is within the sound discretion of the court. When evaluating the reasonableness of attorneys’ fees, the court examines several factors, including the time and labor required, the difficulty of the issues involved, and the skill and effectiveness of counsel reducing the amount requested to eliminate work that was duplicative or was unnecessarily performed by an attorney, rather than a secretary or paralegal. The burden of proving the reasonableness of the requested fees is on the requesting party.
The court may reduce fees that are excessive. The court may also reduce fees where the amount requested lacks proof. Additionally, a fee award may be reduced where there is block billing – the practice of lumping multiple charges together in a single billing entry. Specifically, courts may reduce requested fees when the use of block billing makes it makes it exceedingly difficult for the court to identify whether the amount of time spent on a particular task is reasonable.
Here, the court declines to award the full $83,019.60 in fees that plaintiff seeks with regard to making its sanctions motion. First, the submitted time records contain instances of clear block billing. For instance, on 9/27/23, Mr. Fattaruso inputted a 3-hour entry that stated: “Plan & prepare for oral argument on sanctions motion; review & analyze key documents & authority re: same; teleconfs. w/ CF team re: same; attend court hearing re: same. Additionally, on 9/27/23, Ms. Levine inputted a 3.10-hour entry that stated: “Preparation for court conference and court conference and follow-up regarding same.” Furthermore, on 8/28/23, Mr. Fattaruso inputted a 3.30-hour entry that stated: “Review & revise reply brief in support of sanctions motion and review & analyze key documents, authority, & correspondence re: same.” These block-billed entries prevent the court from determining the reasonableness of the requested attorneys’ fees, as it is impossible to differentiate or specify how much time plaintiffs counsel spent on each of the tasks that are listed. In addition, from what the court can glean from these block-billed time entries, moving counsel appears to have billed excessively. Under these circumstances, the court finds that a 50% reduction to the amount plaintiff requested is appropriate.
(Internal quotations and citations omitted).