Services & Fees
The fees quoted below are available only to law firms and licensed attorneys with active practices.
Generally, the fees are available for appearances in any court or agency within my geographic area, which is generally the five boroughs of New York City, Long Island, and certain downstate counties in New York State. I am not available for appearances in any state other than New York.
Within New York, I do not handle appearances in the U.S. District Courts (including E.D.N.Y. and S.D.N.Y.), and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. I will handle appearances in the Bankruptcy Courts in E.D.N.Y. and S.D.N.Y. The reason for the limitation with respect to federal courts is that federal courts are openly hostile to per diem attorneys. They will refuse to hear a per diem attorney. Sending a per diem attorney is almost the equivalent of not appearing at all. The only way to get around this problem is a co-counsel arrangement, which would require me to become and stay familiar with the entire file.
There is another exception to the general rule that I will not cover appearances in federal court. I will cover, for standard rates, depositions in matters pending in federal court.
The fee paid for an appearance includes the preparation of an appearance report. I generally try to get the report to you on the same day of the appearance. If not on the same day, I have only rarely gone past the day immediately following the appearance. The idea is to get you a written report as promptly as possible.
I try to keep my reports short. However, some appearances require reports that include a lot more detail. In preparing appearance reports, my objective is to place you as close as possible to actually being at the appearance without going over material covered elsewhere. For example, I don’t give you a verbatim report of what went on in a deposition because you’ll be getting a deposition transcript. I don’t include all the dates covered in a Preliminary or Compliance Conference Order, because those dates are covered in the Order.
If an appearance results in an Order or stipulation, I will scan the document and forward it to you with my report. I will not forward originals if the original that I have is only a photocopy of the original. But, if the document I received is something other than a photocopy, I will mail it to you, generally with a second copy of my report to help your staff figure out what the document is about when received.
The fees quoted here really only an initial response to a question that an assigning attorney might ask me as an appearance attorney: How much do you need to cover this appearance? These rates are intended only to start our conversation. A fee is fair depending on a lot of things, such as the nature of the case and the assignments, and the nature and location not only of the court, but sometimes even the court part. The rates quoted here are general rates. The actual fee that I will charge for an appearance depends on the actual assignment.
Conferences in Courts and Administrative Agencies
Standard Conferences
One appearance in one session (AM or PM) — $125.00
Second appearance in same courthouse during the same session (AM or PM) — $75.00.
Additional appearances in same courthouse during the same session (AM or PM) — $50.00 each
For my purposes, the term conference includes any type of appearance as long as no testimony is taken or evidence received. But there are exceptions. For example, I will treat a hearing in a Workers’ Compensation proceeding as a conference, because even when evidence is being taken, Workers’ Compensation sessions are usually very short and focused. Generally, if the assignment is simple and short enough, I will treat it as a standard conference.
The term standard conference includes landlord-tenant hearings, preliminary conferences, compliance conferences, pretrial conferences including those in civil or district court, status conferences, foreclosure status conferences, returns of motions, code violation conferences, and appearances in trial scheduling parts. My hope is that standard conferences are quick, simple, and straight-forward. When a conference starts getting demanding, it might not be a standard conference anymore. Thus, some traverse hearings might be standard conferences, while others might be complex conferences or even trials.
My hope is that my assignments are going to be quick and simple. Just get an adjournment. Just get a standard preliminary conference order. However, that an appearance might involve a long wait doesn’t usually make that appearance complex, or demanding. (An exception to this might involve a difficult judge notorious for making almost everything a long, complex process.) As an appearance attorney, I hope to get other appearances to fill-in the wait time on a particular assignment, and to make the morning economically fruitful.
If an appearance goes into the afternoon, the afternoon session is a separate appearance. In other words, the afternoon session will double my fee. Don’t worry. This happens only rarely.
Also rare is the case involving two tasks on the same day. For example, a case is scheduled for a status conference, and the return of a motion. If the conference and motion are scheduled for the same courtroom and st the same time, that case, despite the two tasks, is one assignment. But if the conference is in one courtroom, and the motion is in another courtroom, the case involves two assignments. In short, if I have to go to two courtroom on one case, I will need to charge two fees because I’ve covered two assignments.
The geographic coverage for these Standard Conference rates is limited to courts and agencies in Nassau County, courts and agencies west of Riverhead in Suffolk County but including Southhampton Town Court, and courts and agencies in and around Jamaica or Kew Gardens in Queens County.
Complex Conferences
For each appearance classified as complex, add $125.00
Sometimes, you know that a particular assignment is going to be messy or require a lot of extra attention. If it requires so much time that it effectively prevents me from taking other assignments, it is a complex assignment calling for a higher fee.
You never know how it is going to go in court. That is, when initially assigned, an assignment can look like something quick and simple calling for a standard rate, but then something unexpectedly happens. Maybe, a member of the court’s staff may swallow a bug of some kind, and, before you know it, you’re dealing with a mess. So, if an assignment unexpectedly turns out to be complicated, I will have to bill you for a complex conference.
A complex assignment is demanding, not only with respect to time needed to be spent, but also effort needed to be expended. A complex assignment might involve multiple conference sessions, perhaps with multiple court staff. It might involve the negotiation of a non-standard, that is, complicated, Order or Stipulation. It might involve multiple telephone calls to your office to get additional information or authorizations.
An indicator that an assignment has become complex can be found in the appearance report for the assignment. If the report addresses a number of different issues or goes beyond one paragraph or one page, it indicates that the assignment was complex.
Here is an example of a standard assignment becoming complex: I was asked to cover what was labeled as a mediation. The assigning attorney believed the mediation was going to be adjourned because a new party had just been added. When I arrived at the assignment, the judge started asking if the new party had “appeared.” Because the judge suspected that the new party had not yet become part of the case, the judge didn’t want to adjourn the mediation. There were a lot of parties in the case already. So, not unexpectedly, it had been very difficult scheduling the mediation. So, rather than adjourn, we mediated. The mediation not only took up the entire morning, but went into the afternoon. This sort of thing thankfully doesn’t happen often, but it does happen.
You might want to classify an appearance as complex in advance. Why? Because, if you tell me it is going to be a complex appearance, I will prepare more carefully, maybe even calling you in advance to get clarification.
The premium for complexity applies regardless of the location of the conference. In other words, the premium for a complex assignment will be in addition to any premium for a distant or very distant assignment.
If I am doing multiple appearances for you, I will classify the later (not the earlier) assignments as complex. For example, I am doing three appearances for you. One is complex. Here, the complex assignment will be number three, so that the fee for that assignment would be $175.00, rather than $50.00 for a standard assignment. If the complex assignment were number one, the fee would be $250.00.
Distant Conferences
For the first or only appearance, add $125.00
Like Lincoln said, a lawyer’s stock in trade is the lawyer’s time. That applies as much to an appearance attorney as it does to any other attorney. So, if an appearance is going to involve more time because of travel, I need some compensation for the extra time.
The additional fee or premium for “Distant Conferences” is added only to the first assignment in the court that is considered distant. For example, I have four appearances for you in Civil Court, Bronx County. You pay the distance premium only once, and not for each of the four assignments.
A conference is distant if it takes place in courts or agencies east of Riverhead in Suffolk County, courts and agencies west and north of Jamaica and Kew Gardens in Queens County including Long Island City, and courts or agencies in Kings County (Brooklyn), New York County (Manhattan), Bronx County, and Westchester County.
Very Distant Conferences
For the first or only appearance, add $200.00
I really don’t want to take conferences in courthouses that I consider very distant, but I know that sometimes it is very difficult to find anyone to cover appearances in certain courts. I would prefer that these very distant conferences go to an attorney closer to the courthouse, but that isn’t always possible. Because I want your good will, if you get stuck, I’ll help you out, but I need to be compensated for the time.
Very Distant Conferences work the same way as Distant Conferences, except for the amount of the premium. That is, the additional fee or premium for “Very Distant Conferences” is added only to the first or only appearance in the court that is considered very distant.
A conference is very distant if it takes place in courts or agencies in Richmond (Staten Island), Rockland, Putnam, Orange, Dutchess, Ulster and Sullivan Counties.
There are courts which take me only about 20 minutes to reach. Appearances in those courts involve standard fees because travel is not a major component of the assignment. An appearance in Richmond County is likely to take me two hours to reach, and will take a fair amount of time on the return. Obviously, travel is a major component in an assignment in a very distant court. I ask for a premium for an assignment in a distant or very distant court because of the time required to get to those courts.
If you want me to cover an assignment in a court which is even more distant, we will need to discuss the fee before I will accept it.
Depositions, 50-H Hearings and Examinations under Oath
Standard Depositions
One witness — $225.00
2nd witness — add $150.00
Additional witnesses — add $75.00 for each additional witness
The term “deposition” includes examinations before trial, 50-H hearings, examinations under oath and any other situation where the testimony of a witness is being taken and stenographically recorded, but not before a judicial, hearing or administrative officer. That is, it’s a deposition as long it isn’t a formal trial or hearing.
I am using flat fees for depositions because I find most attorneys and firms, like clients, like flat fees. But I am amenable to an hourly rate of $125.00 per hour, with a minimum of $250.00 for the entire deposition, but time would also include transportation time.
The fee includes preparation, preparation of the client/witness at the site of the deposition, a short debriefing of the client/witness on the completion of that client’s deposition, and preparation of a deposition report. If a client appears but is not scheduled to testify, I will greet the client, and provide appropriate explanations to the client during the course of the deposition.
In setting the rate for depositions, I would have liked something like the two daily sessions in court, but the start time of a deposition can be anything the parties find convenient. So, it is conceivable to have a start time of 1:00 PM, the time at which most state courts shut down for lunch. That break is what delineates the morning session from the afternoon session. You don’t want an extra charge for an afternoon session starting an hour or even a half hour after the scheduled start time of a deposition.
So, the rates shown here are based on blocks of time of four hours, with time starting with the time the deposition is scheduled to begin, or the time I arrive, whichever is later. (I generally try to arrive early to settle in.) If the depositions of a set of witnesses goes beyond four hours, there are extra charges for the extra session. For example, say the deposition of one witness is seven hours. The total charge for that deposition of that one witness will be $450.00, because seven hours involves more than one four hour block of time. Or, say that there are three witnesses to depose. I am not going to hold you to strict measures of time. So, if the first witness takes 4 hours and 19 minutes to complete, that is a four hour deposition covering one block of time. So, if the first witness takes about four hours, and the other two witnesses together take about another two and a half hours, the total fee for this deposition will be $600.00, or $225.00 for the first witness in the first session and $225.00 for the second witness (or first witness in the second session) plus $150.00 for the third witness (or the second witness in the second session).
The geographic coverage of these Standard Deposition rates is limited to depositions actually held in Nassau, Suffolk as far east as Central Islip, and Queens Counties.
Distant Depositions
Add — $125.00
The rates for distant depositions are the same as for standard depositions except there is a premium for the extra travel time. It is applied in the same way as the premium for a distant conference, That is, it is added only once, essentially to the first or only witness. If one or more witnesses goes beyond the first four hour block, there is no additional premium for distance for the second session.
A deposition will be considered distant if it takes place at a location east of Central Islip in Suffolk County, or at a location in Kings (Brooklyn), New York (Manhattan), Bronx or Westchester County.
Very Distant Depositions
Add — $250.00
As with very distant conferences, I really don’t want a very distant deposition, but, if you get stuck, I’m willing to help provided I’m compensated for the extra time.
The premium for a very distant deposition is applied the same way as a distant deposition. So, see the section for distant depositions for additional guidance.
A deposition will be considered very distant if it takes place at a location in Richmond (Staten Island), Rockland, Putnam, Orange, Dutchess, Ulster or Sullivan County.
Trials and Hearings in Courts or Administrative Agencies
Standard Trials
Half Day — $400.00
Full Day — $800.00
The term trial refers to the taking of testimony or other evidence in any court or administrative agency before a judicial, or hearing or administrative officer. Generally, it would not include relatively simple or quick hearings. For example, I would not normally consider most workers’ or unemployment compensation hearings to be trials even with the taking of testimony, and would likely charge you only for a standard or complex conference. Although mediations do not involve the taking of testimony, at least some mediations involve as much time and effort as a trial. So that, though I don’t always bill a mediation like a trial, sometimes mediations need to be treated like trials.
Fees include general preparation, the preparation of opening and closing statements, the preparation of proposed jury charges and verdict sheets, participation in jury selection, charge conferences and other conferences, and post-trial motions. The rate also includes the preparation of a post-trial appearance report.
I am assuming that you are not going to assign me complex cases that may require relatively high levels of preparation. If you would like to retain me for more complex trials, we will need to discuss fee arrangements before I accept the assignment.
The rates for trials are for trials taking place in Nassau, Suffolk, Queens, Kings (Brooklyn), New York (Manhattan), Bronx or Westchester County.
The rates largely do not include Richmond (Staten Island), Rockland, Putnam, Orange, Dutchess, Ulster or Sullivan County, especially if we are talking about a multi-day trial, because I do not believe I can reasonably commute to and from these counties after a full day of trial. I would be willing to cover a half-day or one-day trial in these counties for a distance premium of $250.00. If you need to have a multi-day trial covered in one of these counties, we will need to discuss arrangements before I accept the assignment.
Occasionally, you may need someone to cover something that may not necessarily be in court, such as an IME, or an expert’s examination of a location or a physical object. I would be happy to help you with something like this.
Cost: base fee of $175.00 with premiums for distance and complexity, usually $175.00 or $350.00.
For the definition of distance, see the distance premiums for Conferences.
Forms
Like many attorneys, over the years I have developed an extensive form library. I am considering making these forms available to you. A simple form such as an RJI or a Notice of Trial, would cost about $75.00, completed and ready to file. More complex forms would cost somewhat more.
If you would be interested, I’d appreciate your letting me know.
If I decide to offer form preparation, I will post a price list. In the meantime, you can call and ask me about preparing a form or set of forms for you.
Research & Writing
I know there are attorneys who hate doing paperwork. Well, I’m an exception. I don’t mind paperwork, and am really pretty good with it. I have written pretty complicated briefs to the Second Circuit, and complicated and fairly simple briefs to the First and Second Departments. I have also written all kinds of memoranda of law to both federal and state courts. I have access to the case law, statutes and regulations of all 50 states and the District of Columbia, and federal case law, statutes and regulations. So, if you are looking for help with appeals or motions, I’m available.
I can also prepare discovery demands and discovery responses for you.
The fee for this type of work is $150.00 per hour.
Co-Counsel Arrangements
As indicated above, I do not accept per diem appearances in federal courts, because of the very hostile attitude of federal judges toward per diem attorneys. The way around this hostility is a co-counsel arrangement.
If you ask me to enter into a co-counsel arrangement with you on one of your files, I will file a notice of appearance with the court as soon as we enter into the arrangement. I will also read all documents filed in court in that matter, getting access to those documents through PACER, if you don’t otherwise provide me with a copy of the complete file. I will also read anything else you believe I should review to get up-to-date on the file. Whenever you ask me to make an appearance in the matter, I will ask you for an update, and review any additional documents that may have been filed in the matter in court since my last review.
This arrangement is also available to out-of-state attorneys with matters pending in state court. I will of course keep up with the documentation through NYSCEF.
Costs: $1,500.00 up front, plus appearance charges (as if this were a regular per diem arrangement)
You will, of course, know the file better than me, but, if you need to have an appearance covered because you just can’t cover it or because it is too distant, it will be covered by an attorney who is at least very familiar with the file.
Other Arrangements
The rate discussed above are standard rates I have set to give you guidance as to the level of compensation I need for assignments that you may give me. However, if there are special circumstances involved, I’d be more than will to discuss special rates.