How does being hired on retainer work?

Issy

It would depend on what services you are offering, your certifications and credentials as a professional in that particular industry.

Fees should range from $1000.00 per week to $5000.00 per week, a written contract is necessary. Being on retainer may seem like easy money, but you had better "know your stuff" or you could be committing wire fraud if you accept money across state lines.

Retainer fees paid to you would be reported on a 1099 by your client as fees for professional services, you must file the income on your tax returns. Being on retainer is a legal binding contract with severe legal consequences if you are found unreliable. Lawyers have insurance if they get sued.

Issy

CatLaw

Retainers for lawyers can work in two general ways. 1. The client pays lawyer/law firm a certain dollar amount to be available at any time for any type of legal work. In reality this is usually a contract between a very well respected law firm and either a very wealthy person or a company. For the client, they have the security of know that all their legal work will be handled by this one firm, there is no shopping around, and the firm will do its best to keep this client happy. There is no set dollar amount, it is up to the lawyer/law firm to set an amount that will cover being able to immediately handle work for this client. Many of these formal retainer contracts are for a one year period, but there are no rules on this.

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2. The second way that attorneys use a retainer is as an up-front dollar amount that the attorney bills against. In this case the client gives the attorney an amount of money for a case. The attorney then bills against this amount for the costs of handling the case. In many states this retainer amount must go into an attorney's trust account, the lawyer must provide the client with bills that explain any deductions from this account, at the end of the year the attorney licensing board may audit these account, and any interest accrued is sent by the bank to an account held by the attorney licensing board who use the funds for low cost legal assistance.

The amount of the retainer is connected to the amount of the cost of the case. One reason that attorneys request retainers up front is because much of the attorney's work is done up front especially in a trial, this takes the attorney away from bringing any other paying work, and everyone needs to be paid for what they do. Another reason is that it gets the client involved in the case, if they have a financial stake in it from the beginning. Unfortunately there are clients who are super-eager to sue someone as long as they do not have to pay for the suit or do the work. Getting a retainer up front weeds those out.

This type of retainer will last as long as the case does. In most cases the attorney will come to a point when they exhaust the amount of retainer initially given and will either need the client to provide more funds right away or wait until the case ends to either get that payment from a settlement or winning, OR in payment from the client if the case is lost.

Some attorneys will ask for a retainer amount up front knowing that this amount is not enough to pay for the entire case, but will do the case on contingency (that is they get a percentage of winnings). That gives the attorney some money for his/her work, and the potential of making more if the case wins.

There are no rules as to how much attorneys can be paid or how often.

terry mccall

my attorney was hired to represent me on driving charges, they were dismissed, without ever going to trial. The state later directly indicted me on a meth charge that had been dismissed at the preliminary level. But the state got a direct indictment. I was never served with the charge. I was tried in me absence convicted and sentenced to 5yrs in prison. Now this attorney whom i only hired for driving charges DID represent me at a trial for this meth charge and did so without my consent or even hiring her. She even tells the court that she was only hired for driving charges by still the court lets her proceed. Remember I had never been served with my charge either. so how could i hire a lawyer for a charge that I never had.. Last month 3-17=11 the sentence and conviction was vacated and i was granted a new trial. given time served. But I did get the 5yrs reduced to the 441 days served. What can I do to this attorney for representing me without being hired or retained to do so. Is no this a crime... contact me at 706 376-3370 Terry McCall I need a lawyer to help me in this matter

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