Free Consultation Prior to Any Legal Fees
On this page, our Pittsburgh litigation attorneys explain legal fees that we charge. Talk to a living, breathing, and highly experienced lawyer for free. Our office answers a couple of questions for free over the phone. However, to get reliable opinions about your case, you should engage us to speak
Contingency Representation Fees
In certain instances, we do not charge an hourly fee and, instead, seek as our a fee a portion of the money you recover in your claim or lawsuit. This typically occurs where you are seeking a significant financial recovery. Examples include a serious physical injury (full or limited tort, biking accident, e-bike crash, or e-scooter injury), or a pedestrian struck by a car. We look for exceptions to limited tort, where, for example the negligent driver gets a drunk driving charge, or his car is registered out of state.
Other examples contingency agreement cases include: breach of an agreement, involving a significant construction law dispute, debt collection, etc. Here, the opposing party may have either money or insurance to pay you.
Getting Another Party to Pay Your Legal Fees
In most instances, PA follows the “American Rule.” This means, each side pays their own fees, generally, unless there is a statute that allows one party to recover theirs from the other. There are, however, many instances where the opposing party can be ordered to pay your legal fees. Examples includes: trade secret litigation, violations of unfair trade practices and consumer protection law, bad faith insurance practices (wrongfully denying a claim or placing an unfairly low value on it), Home Improvement and Consumer Protection Law, reckless or fraudulent conduct, or breach of contract, but only where the agreement allows the recovery of attorney fees.
Hourly Legal Fees
In cases where we charge an hourly fees, we make sure our representation is strategic, client focused, and offers great value. With a great strategy, paying a lawyer by the hour can be cost-effective.
One area we handle hourly is construction law defense, or the defense of enforcement of an action to perfect a mechanic’s lien. Note, however, if the mechanic’s lien relates to home improvement, there can be a claim by the homeowner for an award of her attorney fees, but that is not guaranteed.
Another area we handle by the hour is non-compete agreement litigation. Here, the law is changing at the federal level, to do away with non-competes. This, however, will only motivate employers to get more creative in terms of suing outgoing employees. We expect the focus will turn to targeting former employees for allegedly misappropriating trade secrets or soliciting employees or customers. Another option for employers is to sue for trade disparagement, which is defamation as it relates to a business.
Blended Fee Agreements For Legal Fees
In some instances, we do a “blended agreement,” where the agreement is part hourly, and part contingency. This occurs where there is significant (higher than normal) risk of you/us not recovering any money relative to your claim. Sometimes it makes sense to share the risk. Thus, one option is for the lawyer to get paid something hourly (not the usual hourly rate of $225/hr.) but instead gets paid only $110/hr. The attorney would also gets a portion of any money recovered in the lawsuit or claim.
These things are best explained in person or over the phone. Call any time for more information.
Flat Fees
In many cases that we handle regularly, such as litigation in state, federal or small claims court matters, we provide a one time $200 flat fee for the review of the claim or defense. We also provide flat fee consultations for construction and renovation matters, involving general contractors and subcontractors.
If the matter involves a credit card debt dispute, we handle the defense in stages: one fee for the first set of objections to the law suit, another fee (hundreds not thousands) for negotiation, etc.
Pointing You in The Right Direction
We learn enough about your legal matter to quote you a good faith estimate to review your matter in greater detail. The detailed review is extremely important, because from that, we generate a customized litigation plan to save your time and money over the long haul.
