We have hired an attorney in California regarding a divorce / child custody case.
He seems to be doing a great job, but I'm completely stunned with his bills.
At his initial consultation he asked for a $3500 retainer and assured us that it would be unlikely that we needed all this and he expected that we would get a refund.
But after only the initial court hearing he sent his first bill. It was above $4000, so the retainer had already been used! We paid another $1500 retainer which is now also used just a few phone calls and "research" later. And we are nowhere near an end of the case.

He charges for every phone call, every email read.
For example he ran up $500 in charges just to schedule a meeting.
- called other parties attorney, left a message $40
- received a call from other attorney, $60
- called the judge to ask for availability $40
- called to other attorney to confirm $40
- called Client to update $80
- received a call for judge $40
etc. etc. etc.
This is just a small part of his bills which are pages long.


Again he appears to be doing a great job, but we are getting to a point where we can no longer afford this.

Is it common to be charged like that?

While I won't say it is completely normal I won't say is is uncommon either. There are tons of lawyer that bill for everything and those charges add up. As long as you can add up the bills with all the small charges and both you and the attorney reach the same number then you may just have hired an attorney out of your price range. I know this is a hard way to find out but you may want to look around for another one or take in a hundred bucks for another visit and ask him/her what it will take to lower the costs like if you can do some of the foot work too. That might not help but it could be worth the shot.

Being that I worked in a law firm in Illinois, the lawyers charged between $1,500 - $3,500 for retainer fee. They also charged for every copy made, every fax sent, every piece of mail sent out including fed ex, every email, phone call, and everything that has to do with the case you get charged for. Lawyers are a rip off but what are you going to do.

It depends on what the attorneys hourly charges are and what he breaks down as far as time goes. Some attorneys bill by 10th hours and some bill by quarter hours. While these appear to be things that can be billed for, it should not cost $500 to "schedule a meeting." If he charges $250 per hour then that means he spent two hours scheduling a meeting. That is not efficient nor does it appear to be honest. I can't pass a complete judgment because the situation is unknown. However, it should not take that much to schedule a meeting. Scheduling calls could have been handled by a paralegal or an assistant to save you money.

I practice employment law and deal with a few very large companies. Even though our clients have a lot of money to spend we still try to keep the bills down for them. If there is a fluke that happens where it takes much longer than it should have, we will write down our hours to something more appropriate for the task. While important to be meticulous, it appears that your attorney bills like a junior associate at a NY city firm. The difference is that there is someone writing down the bills for that NY associate and no one is writing down the bills for your attorney.

If there is something that you do not agree with in your bill, you should bring it to the lawyers attention. If he is being shady then he will expect the call. If you maintain silence then that will only give him more courage to inflate his bills in the future.

My father went thorough a similar thing with a divorce attorney. When all was said and done, he had about $1600 that had not been spent. Between the time he called for a final statement and the time he picked up his refund check (about two days later) there was $600 left. Bottom line is that there are honest lawyers and there are dishonest lawyers. If they have your money they are going to find a way to spend it.

Yes its not unusual for an attorney to nickel and dime you like that. I was watching an episode of Eli Stone (1st season DVD) the other night and there was a scene where one of the partners was complaining that the use of the copiers had gone down. He made that point that the copiers were a profit center for the firm and they billed clients for copies at a markup.

Before everyone screams about lawyers and their billings, keep in mind that we have to bill like that or we'd be out of business. In California, 25% of the lawyers earn less than $50,000 per year (less than some high school-only-educated guys working for a supermarket who only need to know, "Paper or Plastic?").

I don't charge for postage, faxes, paper or small stuff but I do for phone calls and anything else I do. Sorry it costs a bunch but what can we do? Who's going to pay the rent, the taxes, for the secretary, and on and on?

Before everyone screams about lawyers and their billings, keep in mind that we have to bill like that or we'd be out of business.

Granted. Lawyer's incomes are generally not steady. Unless you are in a large firm that has a lot of clients on retainer, your income can hit peaks and valleys. The only thing you have to sell is your time. Unfortunately, there are some attornies who bill 10 hours for a 8 hr day.

You can or should discuss fees prior to hiring an attorney

Here in Atlanta it is not uncommom for attorneys to get from 250 to 500 dollars a hour.

The scheduling of meetings should have been handled by his staff and not the actual attorney. If he has no staff, I could possibly see him charging for that kind of scheduling. If he does have a staff, I think he's being a little outrageous on the billing trifles. When I would prepare a bill for a client when I was a paralegal, I would charge only for the attorney's actual time spent reading correspondence or motions, actual phone time, actual preparation of motions and actual court time or time spent with clients in his office. Postage adds up and photocopying adds up also as a lot of trees are used up each year in attorney's offices fighting each other in court.

If he is a solo, then you are paying him to be his secretary and legal research person as well.