3. Do you charge a flat fee or an hourly rate?
Before you sign a retainer agreement with a law firm, you should find out about the way the firm charges for its services. For instance, some attorneys work on a contingency basis—meaning they are only paid if their work is successful—but this is not appropriate in the field of reproductive law, and you should steer clear of any attorney who offers this payment option.
Most attorneys charge an hourly rate, which means you’re billed a set amount for every hour (or part of an hour) that the attorney is working for you. But since it’s nearly impossible to foresee the amount of time your case will take (especially in such a constantly changing area of the law), this arrangement means it will be virtually impossible for you to know how much your legal fees will wind up costing.
Considering all the unforeseeable expenses prospective parents encounter, it’s a great advantage to know up front what your legal fees will be. You can do that if you hire an attorney who works on a flat fee basis. When you retain an attorney for a flat fee, you can budget for your legal fees in advance. Of course, there may be some additional expenses, such as court filing fees, but these are usually minimal.
4. Where are you licensed to practice law?
Attorneys must be licensed by each state to practice law there. As you will discover when you begin your search for legal advice, individual lawyers and firms in this field come from all over the country. It’s a great advantage to have an attorney who is licensed in the states relevant to your case. Your attorney should be licensed in any states in which any medical procedures are being performed. And if you’re using a “third party” (egg donor, sperm donor, surrogate/gestational carrier), you should try to have a lawyer licensed in at least one (and ideally more) of the states in which the individuals reside. Of course, it would be impossible to find an attorney licensed in all 50 states, but it is important to find an attorney licensed in the state(s) where your clinic is located, where your baby will be born, where you live, where any third parties live, and where the IVF procedure will take place, etc.
5. Do you have a knowledgeable and experienced support staff?
When you retain an attorney, you’re not just hiring one lawyer, but the entire law firm. One sign of a good attorney is having a capable and confident staff who can assist you when the attorney is unavailable. Although a lawyer’s support staff can’t offer legal advice, they can ensure that all other aspects of your case are handled in a timely and professional manner. (On the other hand, a “solo practitioner” who has no office staff, or an attorney with poorly trained or inexperienced personnel, can make the entire process more difficult.) If possible, try to find out how long the employees have been working with the attorney; a high turnover rate may indicate some problems in the office itself.
Melissa B. Brisman specializes exclusively in the field of reproductive law. Her practice is located in Park Ridge, New Jersey. Kelly Solloway, a paralegal trained in reproductive law, works with Melissa Brisman.
A version of this article originally appeared in the Winter 2006 issue of Conceive Magazine.
Related Topics: Assisted Reproduction; Egg Donation; Sperm Donation; Surrogacy
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