Personal injury attorneys get paid when our clients get paid. It’s that simple. And, despite all the ways Tallahassee lawyers advertise their services- including Fasig & Brooks– we haven’t gotten that message out to enough people.
One of the hardest things I have to do as an attorney is tell a client there is nothing I can do to help her because the statute of limitations on her case has run out. As one of our medical malpractice attorneys, Rose Kasweck, discussed in an earlier post, there are laws that dictate how long a person has after being injured, or after learning of the injury, to file a claim against the parties who caused the injury. Once the time has run out, there is nothing I can do to help the client recover damages from an accident.
Harder still, is when a client has delayed seeking help from the personal injury attorneys at Fasig & Brooks because she thought she couldn’t afford our fees.
Personal injury attorneys are compensated when a client recovers damages through a contingency fee based system. Basically, that means that we receive a percentage of the damages as payment for our services. If we don’t recover damages, you don’t pay us a fee.
In Florida, The Florida Bar has set the maximum percentages a personal injury attorney may charge a client. This number varies between 20-40% and is based on the amount recovered, if damages were recovered before a suit was filed, whether the insurance company has admitted liability, and several other factors. Every- EVERY – attorney in Florida must abide by The Florida Bar rules.
One of the reasons personal injury attorneys work on a contingency fee basis is because it’s the right thing to do. It requires a lot of knowledge, time, and resources to fight an insurance company, and most people who have been injured don’t have the resources to be able to pay an attorney up front. Not being able to front the costs of a case should never prevent a victim from receiving justice.
I don’t ever want someone who has been wrongly injured, or whose loved one has been killed, to not receive what they deserve. While not every case is going to result in high damages- and some will result in none- everyone deserves the right to seek justice.
And, while it might sound like a commercial (and it is), it’s important to say again and again, until I never have to tell a client that the clock has run out on her case: Free Consultation. We Don’t Get Paid Unless You Do.
Call me now, before it’s too late.
