Kazan Law

How much will it cost me for you to represent me? What is a contingency fee?

If you decide to retain The Firm as your attorneys, then we will work for you on a contingency basis. That means we are only paid after a judgment has been won or a settlement reached in your case. You do not pay us up front and you will never get bills from us. We do not charge by the hour. Instead, a portion of the money awarded to you will go to this office and the rest will go to you.

It also means that if you decide to go to trial and the jury decides against you, you will get nothing and will owe us nothing. If we take your case, we will take the risk of not being paid.

Most plaintiffs' attorneys in civil cases operate on a contingency fee basis, with some charging up to one-half the recovery. Here's how it works: say the contingency fee is one-third. Then, for each $1,000 in settlements you get $666.67 (two-thirds) and the attorneys who represent you get $333.33 (one-third.)

However, the percentage of the contingency fee is not the only factor: a lot depends on when the contingency fee is subtracted. Many attorneys take their percentage first and then subtract the costs of the lawsuit out of the client's share. (The "costs" are for things like court filing fees, experts' fees and expenses, medical-legal expenses, court reporters, etc.)

But The Firm subtracts the costs first - before the money is divided - so that we share the costs with the client. Our clients therefore get a larger proportion of the money awarded.

For example, if there are $1,000 in settlements and $100 in costs, The Firm subtracts the $100 costs from the $1,000, and then we take our contingency fee out of the remaining $900. So you would get $600 and our fee would be $300. However, if the other system is used, you would get only $556.67 and the law office would get $433.33. In this example the difference may seem small, but in many of our cases the difference could amount to thousands more dollars for our clients.