If you’re involved in any sort of accident, you may need an experienced Columbia personal injury attorney. You’ll probably be worried about how much it’ll cost to hire one. The good news is that it won’t cost you a thing. You don’t have to pay your personal injury attorney in Columbia, South Carolina until it’s resolved. This gives you a chance to have a skilled legal professional by your side without it hurting your pocket.
Depending on how serious your injuries are, you may be out of work for some time. The last thing you’ll want to do is fight with insurance companies. You’re also going to be worried about how you’ll pay the thousands of dollars in medical bills you rack up. If you can prove somebody else was responsible for your injuries, they’ll be heled liable for your medical bills.
Here, we’ll discuss how much it costs to hire a Columbia personal injury attorney. We’ll also explain why it’s in your best interest to retain one sooner rather than later. If you still have questions after reading this article, feel free to contact our office and speak with one of our expert personal injury attorneys in Columbia, South Carolina.
How Common are Personal Injuries?
If you take the word of the personal injury lawyers who advertise on television, the number of personal injuries reported every year is on the rise. The truth is that, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there was a 5.7% drop in injury and illness cases in 2020. But this doesn’t mean people are getting injured less often than before. These statistics are more in line with workplace accidents. The reason the number was down for 2020 was because so many people worked from home during the first year of COVID.
Our Columbia personal injury attorneys are as busy today as they’ve ever been. We see clients who have been hurt in all sorts of accidents. Some of these include:
- Motor vehicle accidents
- Slip and fall cases
- Premises liability
- Product liability
- Workers’ compensation
When we first meet with these accident victims, we don’t charge a dime. All of our clients receive a free, initial consultation. If they choose to retain our firm, we pursue their claim and try to get them as much money as possible. It isn’t until they settle or win their case that we collect our fee.
What is a Contingency Fee?
A contingency fee is the percentage your Columbia personal injury attorney collects once your case is settled or otherwise resolved. Rather than make you pay a fee upfront, your lawyer will wait until the case is settled to receive payment. The reason it’s called a contingency fee is because payment is contingent on winning or settling your case.
This arrangement is beneficial to clients because it allows them to hire an attorney without putting any money down. If personal injury attorneys in Columbia, South Carolina worked like other lawyers, they would charge you a flat fee or bill you hourly for their work. Under either of these arrangements, you would likely pay thousands of dollars upfront. If you didn’t have the money to pay their fee, they would not be able to represent you.
Since it’s incredibly important to have a seasoned personal injury lawyer help with your case, we try to make it easy for accident victims to hire us. Generally, we charge one percentage for cases that don’t go to trial and a slightly higher fee for cases that do go to trial. This is because our attorneys have to invest a lot of time and effort into preparing for trial. They can’t accept new clients while your case is moving along. Therefore, they need to be compensated fairly.
Keep in mind, more than 95% of all personal injury cases do settle. The odds of having to pay the higher rate is lower than you may think.
How Does a Contingent Fee Work for Columbia Personal Injury Attorneys?
As stated above, personal injury attorneys don’t charge their clients anything until they resolve their case. Once the case settles (or an award for damages is issued), then we collect our fee. When a case settles out of court, we typically charge 33% of the settlement proceeds. This percentage comes off the top. Once that is accounted for, your attorney will recover any out-of-pocket expenses associated with your case. This could include any or all of the following:
- Preparation and copying of exhibits
- Fees for legal research services
- Mail and postage services
- Payment for court transcripts and court reporters
- Case filing fees
- Servicing fees
- Any costs incurred to process witness statements
- Depositions and other discovery
- Travel expenditures
- Fees for expert witnesses
Of course, this list is not exhaustive. There are other fees that may accrue with your case. When you first meet with your Columbia personal injury attorney, they can give you a better idea of what your case will entail. For example, not all cases require expert witnesses. The same is true for depositions. If your case settles early, you may not need to do any depositions or even track down witnesses.
How to Find Yourself the Right Columbia Personal Injury Attorney:
When you’re ready to hire an experienced Columbia personal injury attorney, you need to be careful about who you hire. The last thing you’ll want to do is pick an attorney at random. Our lawyers have decades of combined experience handling cases like yours. When you retain our services, you can trust that we’ll do everything we can to get you the compensation you deserve.
At Connell Law, we pride ourselves on providing the best legal services to all our clients. Our personal injury attorneys in Columbia, South Carolina will assist you in all aspects of your claim. We’ll also work hard to negotiate a settlement, so you don’t have to worry about your case dragging on for years. Our goal is to make you whole.
Call our office today to set up a date and time that works for you. Take advantage of the free, initial consultation. This gives you a chance to meet with one of our lawyers and have them review your case. They’ll also answer any questions you may have and give you an idea of what your case is worth.