Client Relations

Tales about  clients from hell abound. Visit any lawyer listserve and you’ll encounter weekly threads populated with complaints about crazy clients or advice on how to fire them. Bad clients aren’t exclusive to the legal profession either – doctors deal with them and one designer even set up a Clients from Hell website dedicated to them.…

I’ve long been a fan of free consultations for a couple of reasons. First, given the importance of the attorney-client relationship, it never made sense to put up obstacles  to clients seeking to vet different attorneys by forcing them to shell out a couple of hundred bucks for each meeting. Second, for some practices –…

This post is part of the MyShingle Solos summer series which will run between June 17 and July 3, 2014.   This post is written by MyShingle Guest Blogger Denise Nichols For my second contribution to the MyShingle Solos summer series, I was planning to share my story of returning to law school after a 20…

Updated September 1, 2022 This post is part of the MyShingle Solos summer series which ran between June 17 and July 3, 2014.  Conventional wisdom on flat fees suggests that attorneys bill in two parts: (a) one flat fee to cover pre-trial activities and potential disposition of the case and (b) a second flat fee…

In the past, I’ve griped about the circa 1970s bar association retainer agreements that abound on the Internet. In fact, that’s one of the peeves that spurred me to put together my ebook, The Art, Science and Ethics of the 21st Century Retainer Agreement . Still, bar associations are perpetually underfunded, so I’m willing to…

Clients who forget checkbooks. Or want to bring a case for the principle of the thing. Or who assure you that they’ve got a multi-million dollar, slam dunk claim.  If you’ve practiced law for even three weeks, you’ve probably encountered at least one of these red-flags. Trouble is, starting out, you may not recognize these…

A colleague recently sought advice on the following (facts have been changed): I recently achieved a fantastic result for an out of state client who had a matter in my jurisdiction.  The client now wants me to help with all of his legal work, and asked me to assist with a matter in his home…

OK, maybe this Engagement Agreement sample, extracted from a Start Up Law Firm Toolkit published by Lawyers Mutual North Carolina isn’t as outdated as the Pony Express.  Still, the engagement letter provision below, which seeks express client authorization for use of any modern day method of communication is so antiquated and short-sighted made me seriously…