Up to 1/3 of us who hire an attorney may not always be very satisfied with the services provided or the costs incurred. Most problems seem to occur in adversarial situations like fighting a case in court.
In court battles around 25% of us may feel our attorney overcharged us, provided lackluster communication and failed to protect us or act quickly enough. Also ranking high in complaints against attorneys is failure to return phone calls and paying too little attention to our case. Overall, you may be happier finding an attorney through word of mouth instead of through advertisements.
Attorneys’ clients may feel they get “nickel and dimed” for every little thing an attorney does for them. You may even get charged when the attorney places phone
calls and emails to other attorneys, their secretaries and to other attorneys’ answering machines or voicemails concerning your case.
Furthermore, you may never know how an attorney may manipulate you just to make his own job easier. One “red flag” is when your case is turned over to a “junior” member of the law firm. You could end up paying for the junior lawyer’s on-the-job training. Instead of getting an experienced attorney to handle your case you may end up paying for the junior lawyer to research what a more seasoned lawyer may already know.
The legal profession is so shrewd that a typical client may hardly be aware that he is being led down a potentially wasteful, costly path.
Some safeguards are, always ask about the experience of the attorney you are considering using on a case. Ask about possible outcomes, how long will the case take, who else will be working on your case, how often and how will you be billed, and can any unforeseen costs be expected or possible?
Ask for an estimate IN WRITING before you take on an attorney’s services and get a ballpark figure of what the total cost should be. Otherwise, fees may add up faster than you can imagine.
Ask about paying a flat fee for services or even a per job pay scale. This way there may be fewer surprises unless the flat fee is way over what it would normally cost to do the job if the attorney was getting paid by the hour.
If you do not ask about fees up front before you hire an attorney you risk high-priced surprises later on when it may be too late and you are out of money to go out and hire a different attorney for help.
Legal representation is a money-making business. Shop around. You will learn more this way when it comes to finding the exact attorney you need for you specific problems.
Moreover, by asking the attorney lots of questions concerning his experience, billing procedures, costs and so forth lets the attorney know you do know something about the legal profession and as a result the attorney may be less likely to try and “railroad” you concerning costs, services rendered and any other matters!
SUPPLEMENTAL SOURCES: CONSUMER REPORTS MAGAZINE FEBRUARY 1996 and MIAMI HERALD NEWSPAPER OCTOBER 16TH 1995