YHK - yet another hacker news clone

As A.I. makes law firms more efficient, clients ask: 'Where's my discount?'

66 points mooreds 2 hours ago 43 comments

Skyy93 1 hour ago | parent

It's even worse with some physicians. When I got an MRI a year or two ago, getting an AI diagnosis cost extra. I am very positive about AI, but I can understand why people would be hesitant to pay extra when they hear about false positives and the unreliability of AI.

youniverse 1 hour ago | parent

Yep one imaging center in LA is charging $45 out of pocket for the AI diagnosis.

pkaye 1 hour ago | parent

can you say no to an AI diagnosis in that case?

Skyy93 1 hour ago | parent

Yes, sorry should have mentioned that. Of course the easy solution is then to simply decline.

fluidcruft 1 hour ago | parent

Are there even any FDA labeled AI diagnostics for MRI? Just about everything I've seen is more things that are meant to help radiologists do things faster (and it's rather debatable whether they ultimately achieve that). The things I've seen gaining traction are very specific measurements (that are not themselves diagnostic) or things that improve workflow.

elicash 1 hour ago | parent

Additionally, BCBS reports that hospitals are using AI to find ways to charge more money: https://www.bcbs.com/about-us/association-news/bcbsa-analysi...

> New analysis from the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association (BCBSA) finds that hospital systems are increasingly billing patient hospital stays as more medically complex, driving nearly $1 billion in additional healthcare costs in just two years. [...]

> More than 60% of hospital systems are now using AI-enabled technologies that can scan lab results and electronic records to identify secondary diagnoses, which could move a patient into a higher-severity, higher-reimbursement billing category.

hammock 27 minutes ago | parent

That…doesn’t sound like a bad thing for patients? That sounds like an increase in the standard of care. I’m not surprised a health insurer is mad about it though

judge2020 19 minutes ago | parent

Adding false secondary diagnoses is one of the most prevalent forms of healthcare upcoding and makes hospitals and health providers a boatload of money.

It sounds like AI is making doing that a lot easier, and probably hard to contest what it finds without running extra tests.

judge2020 23 minutes ago | parent

Upcoding is a tale as old as time (and one of UHG's main tactics for making truckloads of money), but this does seem new and interesting.

Like, obviously only a doctor can diagnose. But, they can use technology to help them look at problems, including AI (literally the most versatile pattern matching software we have, just in natural language and with lower success rates). And they can make their own judgement call on if what the tool output is saying is correct.

However, if a Doctor were to see a bogus secondary diagnosis on their screen, and then dismiss it, they're opening themself up to medical malpractice liability, no? Like, it seems like the safest option would be to run (and bill for) the extra tests to confirm if the AI's story is true or untrue.

dfxm12 1 hour ago | parent

Setting aside the unreliability of AI, healthcare is already expensive and confusing. It's hard to know what's covered or not ahead of time and it sucks to feel nickel and dimed on something that is already so expensive, especially when you consider we are not trained medical professionals, so we can't really have an informed opinion on what this is really worth...

mcoliver 1 hour ago | parent

Always ask for your imaging data. I have never been denied it. Then take that and run it through your own analysis. Years ago I had some lab work done looking for a specific genetic marker that could explain something. While that was running I took my 23andme genome and cross referenced it with snpedia and had my answer (didn't have the marker) before my doctor did. She was blown away. This was 10 years ago. I'm guessing things have improved quite a bit.

LastTrain 1 hour ago | parent

Well we’ve spent over a trillion on infrastructure and we’re only just getting started so good luck getting your fucking discount

ktallett 1 hour ago | parent

I'm sure many law companies have a trillion spare to invest in data centres. I don't think anyone would be upset if AI broke the standard charges for lawyer fees.

mullingitover 1 hour ago | parent

I’m just waiting for the AI judgments, followed by the flash trials, followed by the flash litigation DDOS attacks.

RachelF 42 minutes ago | parent

Australia already has AI tax judgements:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robodebt_scheme

edg5000 1 hour ago | parent

https://archive.is/dmUuD

throwaway89864 55 minutes ago | parent

The issue is that communications with A.I. are not privileged like client-attorney. There was some judge that made that ruling.

Feels like a conflict of interests to me, I'd guess friends, neighbors, children and nieces of that judge enjoying their livelihood by charging for legal services. While legal services are now available under substantially lower rates and with a lot fewer conflicts of interests from A.I. providers...

true_religion 45 minutes ago | parent

They ruled that it's like a journal, or a tool like a search engine. This seems fair.

judge2020 32 minutes ago | parent

But, if you were to represent yourself, are your journal entries about said case privileged? Can the opposition call into evidence a binder of legal strategies you created that morning before court?

At what point does it become a 5th amendment issue? Maybe when we get AI in our corneas a la Black Mirror's The Entire History of You?

anon373839 14 minutes ago | parent

This is a completely straightforward application of existing law on privilege. To maintain privilege, among other things, communications must be confidential.

Chatting with Claude breaks confidentiality: chats with Claude are subject to arbitrary inspection by Anthropic employees, not to mention the issue of model training.

You can use self-hosted LLMs without breaking privilege. And funny enough, law firms like Latham & Watkins are now buying Nvidia GPU clusters for this purpose.

gedy 54 minutes ago | parent

That's basically like devs being 10x with AI - they ain't getting a raise for that..

besterman23 54 minutes ago | parent

So… if AI is reducing time taken for billable actions, then that reduces the cost no? Unless it’s not actually reducing the time spent on said actions.

judge2020 17 minutes ago | parent

Reduces the cost to the medical provider. You think that'll result in a reduced the cost on the person's bill?

dabinat 41 minutes ago | parent

My experience with lawyers is that if you need a legal document, they often have templates ready to go and will take 10 seconds to find & replace your company name into the document. I know this because they often don’t proofread it afterwards. They then charge you $1000 for that 10 seconds of work. Given that I have felt ripped off by many lawyers, I’m totally fine with that industry getting disrupted.

hackyhacky 20 minutes ago | parent

> I’m totally fine with that industry getting disrupted.

Because you'd rather pay your $1000 to OpenAI for 5 milliseconds of work, instead of to a human lawyer for 10 seconds of work?

kshmir 15 minutes ago | parent

Except you probably pay cents in tokens for that, or included with your sub.

throwup238 15 minutes ago | parent

If the human lawyer doesn’t proofread it, whats the point’s the point of a human lawyer? Scapegoat for the AI?

atoav 12 minutes ago | parent

[delayed]

knollimar 11 minutes ago | parent

Weird take on a site with most of us coasting on a near zero marginal cost product.

dataflow 10 minutes ago | parent

[delayed]

Animats 39 minutes ago | parent

Law firms are going to be rolled over by AI. The inefficient law firms will be replaced. Like Expedia, etc. did to travel agents.

nomilk 31 minutes ago | parent

I feel this is the case for a lot of industries (and even a lot of productivity-enhancers, beyond AI).

I remember a much slower change where software slowly ate away the work of property managers. Especially convenient was the ability for the tenant to perform the 6-monthly inspection remotely by uploading a half-dozen photos per room, taking just 15 minutes or so rather than waiting around for several hours for a physical meet up with the property manager. Software also allowed rent payments to be easily automated, collated and monitored.

But I don't think the number of property managers decreased, nor the price that landlords paid for their services.

apical_dendrite 19 minutes ago | parent

When I was looking for an apartment recently, the big "luxury" buildings use AI agents to schedule tours and answer questions. Tours are also self-serve, you don't actually get to meet and talk to anyone. It's a crappy experience. I had to call an AI agent to figure out how to get in the front door of a building and it completely failed to answer this very basic question (fortunately someone eventually saw me knocking). When I toured one large complex there were several groups wandering through the building at once. It did not give me a particularly safe feeling to see that random people going everywhere in the buildings unescorted had been completely normalized.

neya 26 minutes ago | parent

AI is just a tool like everything else. Are you also going to ask me for a discount because I used a powered screw driver?

mpalmer 24 minutes ago | parent

Yes, because I'm expecting you to compete.

tahoeskibum 12 minutes ago | parent

Exactly, somebody using power tools can do a lot more in an hour than somebody using manual tools. That is the real discount.

lizknope 19 minutes ago | parent

I know almost nothing about law firms. But for some other industry if you have 1000 competitors making similar products then companies will compete on price. If you reduce your prices then you will probably get more customers.

If you want to buy a new PC would you rather just have IBM making PCs and setting the price to whatever they want or a thousand different clone companies all competing on price, features, support, etc?

So some new law firm may want to disrupt the industry with a new model

mikert89 14 minutes ago | parent

Spoke with a banker at a well known investment bank in NYC last week. They told the law firm they want the fees cut in half or they walk. This is to a top 5 law firm. Lawyers are trying to charge the same prices, when both sides know they are working half the hours. This is even at the most premium top end, where an engagement bill can run up to 30 million.

edoceo 7 minutes ago | parent

One thing you get from legal council is they'll be ready to defend and contracts or agreements they've made for you. Might be hard to find defense or offense on AI slop contracts. We've seen how AI does code, imagine that inconsistency in legal docs.

socializer 6 minutes ago | parent

Outside of court proceedings, a significant proportion of what law offices do is already extremely streamlined. Stuff like wills, deeds, incorporation paperwork, is all template-based and any remaining work is done by paralegals, then billed at outrageous rates. So I'm not actually sure if AI makes it a whole lot cheaper. Maybe it makes it harder to pretend.

But there's also a good reason why lawyers can keep charging these fees: because they have a say on who can practice the profession. Unlike software engineers and like doctors, they have it figured out and will never allow autonomous systems to represent you or otherwise "practice law".

For some services, the downward price pressure already exists to some extent, in that there are various virtual legal firms licensed in multiple states that provide forms you can fill for $50 a pop instead of $500 a pop. But most consumers still prefer to visit a local law office. I'm not sure this will change with AI. It's really one of these white-collar professions that I think is quite secure.