Family Law, Divorce, Custody and Child Support Attorneys in Colorado Springs, Colorado

Overpaying Attorney Fees

Overpaying for a divorce is usually a result of two things – lawyers charging too much and clients not managing their case adequately.  With regard to attorney fees, clients can best hold lawyers accountable by closely monitoring their billing statements.

Billing statements should be sent to the client at least monthly and on a regular basis.  The statement should clearly describe the activities for which a client is being billed.  For example, “Talk to client” is generally insufficient unless it is in conjunction with another activity, “Research issue of premarital vacation property interest.  Review client’s contract with management company. Talk to client re same.”  Detailed billing statements should be insisted upon.  It’s your best tool for holding your law firm accountable.

However, one attempt we see occasionally is for a client to try and put limits on what the lawyer can do.  Understandably, a client wants to be sure their lawyer doesn’t engage in some activity unnecessarily.  This is just a bad strategy and will not be agreed to by most good lawyers.  Your lawyer has to be free to do their job.  Uninformed limitations on what they can and cannot do will make it impossible for them to fulfill their professional responsibilities.

A better strategy is to ask your law firm to copy you on everything, if you aren’t already.  Again, managing costs depends on accountability.  If you don’t have information about what the law firm is doing on your behalf, it’s nearly impossible to hold them accountable.

(1 votes, average: 3.00 out of 5)

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Paying For a Consultation?

Surprising as it may seem, many law firms charge up to $150 for a consultation with an attorney. If this doesn’t surprise you, it should for the following reason: By law, lawyers are not allowed to give any legal advice to non-clients.

What constitutes legal advice is a constant subject of discussion; however, one thing is clear – a lawyer may not take a non-client’s facts, apply the law to those facts, and draw a conclusion. We can’t chart a strategy or “tell you want you should do.”

So what is it you’re paying for during a consultation?

In our opinion, if you’re charging a person a fee, you’re creating a client. That’s why at Johnson Sauer Legal Group, we don’t charge for our initial consultations and why we limit our consultations to discussions about the law, our fees, time frame, expectations, and the legal process.

Which is still a heck of a lot of information and the same information you’d get for $150, by law. So save the $150 and schedule a Free Consultation with our office by calling 303-394-3030.

(1 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)

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Hindsight is 20/20

Wouldn’t it be great if you could look back at the fees and expenses of a divorce and, based on how things turned out, pick and choose your strategy a little better?

If we’d only known the judge was going to impute income of $5,000 per month instead of the $2,500 we anticipated? Or that the Child and Family Investigator would require supervised parenting time, after all? Wouldn’t that be great if you had all of the information before you charged off and ran up an obscene amount of attorney fees?

Unfortunately, we don’t and there’s just no way of knowing how things will turn out at the end of a case. There is no certainty when you walk through the doors of a courthouse. No matter how confident you might feel, you should always know things can go terribly wrong during your hearing.

That’s why it’s always best to seek out the best legal representation you can, ask your lawyer hard questions that maybe you don’t really want to hear the answers to, and very carefully consider following their advice. Monday morning quarterbacking is inevitable, but with good counsel you stand the best chance of getting the results you want.

(1 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)

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