How Do Attorneys Get Compensated – Hancock Injury Attorneys

Transcript

Hi, I’m Mike Hancock of Hancock law firm. Most of my clients have never had the need to hire an attorney before, let alone have the need to hire an attorney and a personal injury claim. So, most of my clients at some point during our consultation ask me: “Well Mike, how do you get paid? How do I pay you to represent me in this claim?” That’s what I want to discuss in this video.

We represent clients on what’s called a contingent fee agreement. What that means is simply this; we don’t get paid anything until we settle your case or until we go to trial and obtain a verdict in your favor. Our fee is based upon a percentage of your recovery and that percentage is set forth by the Florida Bar. The Florida bar’s the organization that governs all the conduct of attorneys in Florida and the Florida Bar dictates what fees are in these types of cases.

In these types of cases, the contingent fee is going to be one-third of your settlement or recovery. We advance all the costs associated with the claim at the beginning of your claim; those are fairly minimal; those include things like obtaining your medical records, obtaining accident reports. If we can typically settle a claim in the first six to eight months after a collision, those costs are going to be probably in the hundred to two hundred dollar range.

If we have to file a lawsuit on your behalf; if we get to a certain point and we can’t settle it; at that point, you and I would have a discussion and I would say give you my evaluation and, as an example, if an Allstate or a state far more progressive or Geico is offering what I consider to be an unreasonably low amount of money, I’m gonna get on the phone and we’re gonna have a discussion, or you might come into my office and have a discussion with me where I tell you that I think the only way to get a reasonable resolution to this case is to file a lawsuit against the appropriate parties.

If we do file a lawsuit, at that point, if the defendants, let’s say in a rear-end collision, if the defendant’s attorney answers the lawsuit and claims that yes they admit that their client was negligent and they admit that you were injured and the only dispute is how much you’re entitled to, then the fee would still be one-third throughout all phases of the claim including a trial.

However, the only time the Florida Bar allows us to charge an additional fee is if the defendant in a lawsuit denies that their client caused the accident. But, in the case where they deny liability and deny that you are entitled to what we’re looking for, the fee would be 40 percent of the recovery.

So that’s a short explanation of how contingent fee agreements work in personal injury cases. That’s going to be the same wherever you go, whether you have a brand-new attorney working on your case or a large advertising firm working on your case, or whether you have my law firm working on your case.

If you have any other questions, I’d be happy to answer them. Please give me a call at 813.915.1110 or go to my website Hancockinjuryattorneys.com and you’ll find a lot of answers to the many questions that you may have regarding your injury case.