Friday, October 12, 2007
Perhaps not surprisingly, there are hundreds of disputes each year between clients and attorneys in New Jersey.
Decades ago, New Jersey's courts set up a system to deal with attorney-client feuds over legal fees. A volunteer sits down with the bickering parties and tries to hash out a plan that makes sense to everyone, given the amount of work and other factors that went into the case.
Now, a national legal consumer watchdog group has ranked the New Jersey fee arbitration program third in the nation. However, the review of the program found it far from perfect, and assigned the state a B grade.
The review was conducted by HALT — An Organization of Americans for Legal Reform, which released a report card ranking all 50 states as well as Washington, D.C.
"The most pervasive complaint about lawyers is that their fees are too high for the work done," said the group's senior counsel, Suzanne Blonder. "While New Jersey does a better job than most states at settling fee disputes, the state's program stacks its arbitration panels with too many attorneys, adding to the public's perception that the lawyer-client fee arbitration system is of the lawyers, by the lawyers and for the lawyers."
New Jersey got good marks because it offers consumer-friendly online resources and has a requirement that a lawyer submit to fee arbitration at a client's request. The group knocked down New Jersey's score because parties can't publicly discuss all aspects of the dispute or the process.
"By requiring lawyers to participate in fee arbitration and disciplining them for noncompliance, New Jersey's Office of Attorney Ethics sends the message that inflated attorney fees will not be tolerated," said Blonder.
New Jersey ranked just below the District of Columbia and Maine, and none of the top states scored higher than a B average. Three states — New Hampshire, Vermont and West Virginia — flunked.
The state's fee arbitration system has been in place since 1978, making it one of the oldest in the country.
© New Jersey Star Ledger, 2007.
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