The short answer is:
You only pay legal fees to my firm if you make a dollar recovery.
If you do not get a dollar recovery you do not owe me anything at all.
I charge a percentage of the case money.
My fees are pretty much typical for the jurisdictions I practice in.
I never exceed the proper ethical fees of the forum where the case is brought.
For example for Florida I charge a percentage taken off the top of any money you get by way of settlement and/or verdict. The percentage is 33&1/3rd per cent, and if a lawsuit is filed and the lawsuit gets up the point that the opposition files an Answer, then the fees go to 40 percent of the gross amount.
If you have already visited multiple personal injury lawyer websites, have they been so transparent about their legal fees?
If you want to learn more about how legal fees work:
Personal Injury Attorneys mostly use what is called a “contingency fee”.
Unless you have never watched late nite cable tv you have seen multiple ads of lawyers looking very stately and serious, probably with arms crossed and maybe the law bookshelf or courthouse behind them, explaining ” No fees unless you win! “
The law firm takes the risk that it may not get paid a penny for its time and effort.
In exchange, you give the law firm a percentage of the money recovered.
The percentage can vary. Importantly, the way the percentage is calculated can vary.
The most common percentage is the law firm takes 1/3rd off the top.
1/3rd is also the same 33.3 per cent, approximately.
Please read the rest of this content, because the 33&1/3rd may also switch to a higher 40 % and I will explain how and why this usually happens.
So about 33 cents of every dollar goes to the law firm and 66 cents theoretically goes to your injured child. Did you notice that I said theoretically? This is because there will also be costs taken out, and perhaps insurance company liens or subrogation requirements taken out, too.
In some States, the calculation of the (1/3rd) one-third ( 33.3%) attorneys fees happens after deducting costs and medical bill repayments. This is better for you than many other State’s Bar Associations, laws, rules, or regulations permit.
Here is a important concept. These legal fees can go up automatically, to a higher percentage.
If your case is very clear and obvious, or the case is very big, I suggest that you may be able to try from the beginning to negotiate legal fees with the law firm you are interviewing with.
You can try to negotiate not only if the contingency legal fees are taken or calculated meaning before or after costs and liens , you can also try to negotiate the percentages.
In my experience across the decades and through many states, not many reputable and experienced law firms will negotiate off the percentage in any way more meaningful than down to 25 percent. [1/4, of you like to use fractions].
Some laws and rules, especially those about suing the government or government type agencies, including municipal, state, city, prisons, bus transit authorities, may have caps or limits on the legal fees that law firms are allowed to charge.
Up above I explained that there could be circumstances that allow the legal fees to move upwards from typically 33.3% to 40%. When this fee increase happens is easy to understand but it requires a short explanation. Pay attention, this is important. Two things have to happen.
The typical way the fee increases is :
A. When a lawsuit is filed
&
B. Upon the filing of an Answer.
Generally speaking, the Answer is something that comes from the opposition, it is a form of response to your lawsuit.
I have seen instances, thankfully just a few, where the law firm immediately filed a lawsuit on day one for no other purpose than to get a fee increase, and I have also seen just one or two instances where the law firm settled the case after the lawsuit was rightly filed but there was no Answer filed.
So, if your law firm has one of these contingency fee agreements that provides for a increase to 40% in the event that an answer has been filed, ask the attorney ” has an answer been filed?”.
If the lawsuit is far along and depositions have been taken its normally a good indicator that an answer has been filed, because the Answer is usually filed early in the case.
For serious child accident cases, you can look at these contingency legal fees as if the cup is half empty or the cup is half full.
On the one hand you take no up front money risk; the law firm may work and not get paid; and the percentage motivates law firm to use its full resources, expend costs, and give case whatever is the best effort for that particular law firm.
On the other hand the law firm ends up getting paid handsomely for its work.
While negotiating attorney’s fees may appeal to your business sense and frugal nature, I suggest that you focus on finding the best possible law firm, so that when they earn their fees you will know you have obtained the best possible result.
