Attorney: I gave you a copy of my law firm's standard retainer agreement that I give to all my new clients. Did you have a chance to read through it?
Client: Yes, and I have some questions. I’ve never read through an attorney’s retainer agreement before.
A: Okay, let’s cover your questions together before you sign the agreement.
C: First, is anyone else besides you going to be working on my case?
A: Probably, although I will be doing much of the work myself. The retainer agreement says I can staff your case with other attorneys from my law firm according to my judgment. That’s pretty typical language in an attorney retainer agreement.
C: Who else might work on the case?
A: I have some associates, meaning junior attorneys, in the office who work for me. From time to time, I may need their help with specific projects on your case, like legal research or writing court papers, things like that, backroom projects. I will delegate that work to them.
C: Who will be going to court?
A: I will generally be the one going to court on your case.
C: Do you usually go to court by yourself, or do you take another attorney with you? I’ve heard about law firms that always send two attorneys to court or meetings, when they really only need one attorney, and it doubles the cost.
A: I always go by myself, or send one other attorney if I can’t go.
C: So you’ll decide when to bring these other attorneys onto my case? Can I meet them, so I'll know who they are, and they'll know me?
A: Sure, I’ll take you down the hall after we’re done talking and I’ll introduce you to them. If I ask them to help me here and there, it’ll save you money on legal fees. That’s because they have lower hourly rates than me. I charge $250 per hour. Their rate is $150 per hour.
C: Okay, but I’ve been told that hourly rates can be misleading. If an inexperienced attorney takes a long time doing something, even at a lower hourly rate, it could end up costing more in legal fees than if a more experienced attorney did the same work faster, even at a higher rate.
A: That's true.
C: So I don’t mind paying a higher hourly rate for somebody who really knows what they’re doing, and has the experience.
A: I will review each attorney’s hours on your case every month. If I think someone has taken way too long doing something, or if somebody is duplicating somebody else’s work on the case, things like that, I’ll make them explain. I may decide to reduce their hours by writing down their time. That's called exercising billing judgment.
C: I just want the attorneys who work on my case to be efficient billers.
A: I agree, but I won’t know whether they were efficient or not until after they’ve done the work. If I decide to write down their time, I will indicate that on the legal bill each month, so you know.
C: How experienced are the other attorneys in your office who might work on my case? Have they been practicing law for awhile, or are they right out of law school and don’t know anything yet? I’ve heard about law firms that stick clients with beginner attorneys to train them.
A: Most of them have experience. One is right out of law school. Since we are a small law firm, we can’t afford to train too many people. We let the big law firms in town do the training.
C: Can we say in the retainer agreement that you won’t put any brand-new, first-year attorneys on my case without telling me? I don’t want to pay to train some beginner attorney.
A: If you want, we can do that.
C: It's important to me that you stay involved in the case yourself from start to finish. I’m hiring you because Avvo gave you a high rating personally. I’ve heard about people hiring a particular attorney because of their reputation, then their case gets handed off to some other attorney in the office.
A: Since I'm going to be the trial attorney if the case goes that far, I intend to stay involved the entire way.
C: Can we say in your retainer agreement that you will be primarily responsible for handling my case?
A: Sure. And I will supervise any other attorneys who work on the case, too. I just need the flexibility to be able to delegate work on your case to other people at times, because I may be out of town or have scheduling conflicts.
C: I don't have a problem with you delegating. I just don't want to end up with too many people working on my case. I don’t want to have to pay to educate new people on the case again and again.
A: My usual practice is to have one other associate, two at most, team up with me on a case as needed. They will understand the issues in your case. Maybe a paralegal, too, because there are things a paralegal can do cheaper than attorneys. Paralegals have lower hourly rates than associate attorneys.
C: Can we say in your retainer agreement that no more than three attorneys, including you, will bill on my case? It's a pretty straightforward case. I just don’t want to pay for a whole “platoon” of attorneys. I’ve heard about that happening at other law firms.
A: Yes, since that will still allow me to delegate to associates.
C: What if one of those associates leaves your law firm, and you have to assign another associate to my case? You won’t charge me for their getting-up-to-speed time, will you?
A: No, because that’s not your fault. That's my responsibility.
C: If I have questions or need information about my case, who do I call first?
A: I’ll be your first point of contact in the office. If I’m not here, you should ask for my secretary. She will route your call to the right person in the office.
C: I’m a real stickler for having people return my phone calls. I’ve heard about attorneys who never return their clients’ phone calls, or who always have their secretaries do it for them. I want to be able to speak to my attorney, maybe not every single time, but at least when it’s important.
A: My policy is to return a client’s phone call myself within 24 hours, unless the call is so routine that I can have my secretary or another attorney in the office do it. If I'm in trial or out of town, it may take a little longer.
C: How will you record your time on my case, since you’re going to be billing me hourly?
A: All attorneys and paralegals in my office bill in tenths-of-an-hour. So if it takes 6 minutes or less to do something, you’ll get billed 1/10th of an hour at that person’s hourly rate. It gets rounded. Six minutes is 1/10th of an hour.
C: What if something takes more than 6 minutes?
A: If it takes 7 - 12 minutes, you’ll get billed 2/10th’s of an hour, and so forth. Unlike some law firms, we don’t bill in quarter-of-an-hour increments. Those law firms would charge you a minimum of 15 minutes for everything they do, including each short phone call.
C: I've never seen a legal bill before. Can you show me a sample of what your legal bill will look like each month? I’ve heard about clients getting “sticker shock” when they receive their legal bill.
A: I’ve attached a sample legal bill to my retainer agreement. It shows you the name of the attorney who did the work each day, a description of their work, the date it was done, and how much it cost. It also shows you the amount of time they spent on each piece of work.
C: Do I need to add up everything myself to see how much time everyone spent on my case each month?
A: No, because at the end of the legal bill, there’s a list of all the attorneys and paralegals who worked on your case that month, plus their hourly rates and the total hours they billed.
C: How do I read this sample legal bill?
A: Each piece of work on your case is a separate line item listed in chronological order. That's called single-task billing. Like you see on your credit card statement, telling you each place you spent money that month, and exactly how much you spent there.
C: What else is there?
A: We always include a short description that explains the purpose or subject matter of each task, like a phone call, letter, meeting, etc. That way, you know why we did something, and how it relates to your case.
C: I’ve heard of law firms that do just the opposite of what you do. They don’t break out each task separately in their legal bills. Instead, they lump together a lot of different tasks in a single line item, and don’t tell you how much time each task took.
A: Yes, that's called block billing. It's allowed. Those law firms presumably can explain their charges. But we bill differently than that here.
C: Your retainer agreement says that, after I get your legal bill, I have to notify you within 30 days if I have any questions or objections about your legal bill, otherwise I will be deemed to have accepted it. What does that mean?
A: I call that a pay-or-object provision. I put that in my retainer agreement because I’ve had some clients in the past who never said a word to me for months or even years about anything being wrong with my legal bills. Then they suddenly stopped paying me and began complaining that I had overbilled them 12 or 18 months before.
C: So it's like when my bank sends me my checking account statement each month, and says I’m supposed to look at it within 30 days to catch any problems. I've never paid attention to those deadlines before, so I guess I’ll have to start doing it now with your legal bills.
A: All you have to do is call or e-mail me within 30 days if you have any question or problem, anything you don't understand. I’ll respond, and we’ll work it out somehow. I just don’t want to find out many months later.
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© 2008 Ken Moscaret. All rights reserved.