Partner
You are not trying to get rich. You are trying to get the medical bills covered and your paycheck back. So when a law firm advertises no win, no fee, the question underneath it is a practical one: what is this actually going to cost me? The short answer is that you owe no attorney fee unless we recover money for you. The longer answer involves case expenses and repayment claims, and you deserve to hear it up front. A North Mississippi personal injury attorney at Chatham Gilder Howell Pittman will give you both answers.
Your Attorney Fee and Your Case Expenses Are Not the Same Thing
The phrase no win, no fee describes exactly one thing: the attorney fee. It does not automatically describe every dollar it takes to build a case. Those are case expenses, and they are tracked separately.
Case expenses are the out-of-pocket costs of investigating a claim and proving what happened to you. In a typical North Mississippi injury case they can include:
- Court filing fees and the cost of serving the other side
- Copies of medical records, imaging, and itemized billing
- Scene investigation and accident reconstruction
- Court reporters and deposition transcripts
- Expert witness fees for treating physicians and engineers
- Postage, travel, and preparation of trial exhibits
Most injury firms advance these costs so that you never write a check while the case is pending. What differs from firm to firm is what happens to those advanced costs when a case does not produce a recovery. Some firms absorb them. Others ask the client to repay them.
That answer belongs in your written fee agreement, and you are entitled to ask for it before you sign. In Mississippi this is not just good practice. State ethics rules require a contingency fee agreement to be in writing, signed by you, and to spell out the fee percentage and how case expenses are handled, so the written agreement is where these answers belong
How the Percentage Is Set and Why It Can Change
Lawyers are paid in several different ways, including by the hour, by flat fee, or out of what they recover for the client. Injury firms use the last of those, and there is no single national rate attached to it. In personal injury work the lawyer is commonly paid a share of the amount recovered that falls somewhere between 20 and 50 percent, and where a particular case lands often depends on how far it travels before it resolves.
That last part surprises people. A claim resolved through a demand package to an insurance adjuster takes far less work than one tried to a jury in DeSoto County. Fee agreements usually reflect that gap with tiered percentages. A tier that steps up if suit is filed, and steps up again on appeal, is not a penalty for going the distance. It reflects the additional years of work that the later stages require.
We cover the mechanics of contingency arrangements in more depth in our explanation of how personal injury attorneys get paid. Whatever tiers your own agreement uses, you should be able to recite them from memory before you sign it.
What Else Comes Out of a Settlement Before You See It
The attorney fee is rarely the only thing subtracted from a recovery. Two other factors can move the final number, and neither one is the law firm’s doing.
The first is fault. Mississippi follows a pure comparative negligence rule. Being partly at fault does not bar you from recovering anything, but your damages are reduced in proportion to your own share of the negligence. If a jury values a case at $100,000 and assigns the injured person 20% of the fault, the award drops by $20,000 (20%) before anything else is calculated. This is also why insurance adjusters work so hard to pin some of the blame on you.
The second is repayment of medical bills. When a health insurer or a benefit program has already paid for your treatment, it may seek to be paid back out of your recovery. Whether it can, and how much it can take, depends on the specific plan or program involved. Sorting that out early, and negotiating it down where possible, is one of the quieter ways a case ends up putting more money in a client’s pocket.
Neither of these is a reason to skip making a claim. They are reasons to work with someone who accounts for them honestly instead of quoting you a number that ignores them.
Questions Worth Asking Before You Sign Anything
A fee agreement is a contract, and you are allowed to read it slowly. Before you sign one, ask the lawyer sitting across the table:
- What percentage applies if the case settles, and does it change if suit is filed or appealed?
- Are case expenses deducted before or after the fee is calculated?
- Who pays the case expenses if there is no recovery?
- Will the firm advance the cost of experts, or will I be asked to?
- Who will handle my file day to day, and can I reach that person directly?
- How will medical bills and insurance repayment claims be handled at the end?
A lawyer who cannot answer these questions in easy-to-understand terms, or who seems irritated that you asked, has told you something useful about how the rest of the case is likely to go. We put our answers in writing, because a client who understands the arrangement makes better decisions from the first phone call to the last check.
Waiting Is the One Thing That Actually Costs You
A free consultation costs nothing. Delay is different, because delay can cost you the claim itself.
Mississippi generally gives you three years from the date a claim accrues to file a personal injury lawsuit. Three years sounds like plenty until you consider what happens during it. Skid marks wash off the pavement. The vehicle gets repaired or sold for scrap. Store surveillance video is often written over on a thirty-day loop. A witness who remembered the light clearly in March is no longer sure by August. Every one of those losses makes a case harder to prove and easier for an insurer to discount.
Because we are paid only if we recover, we have every reason to begin while the evidence still exists. Calling early commits you to nothing. It simply keeps the door open.
Talk to Us Before You Sign Anything
You should not have to gamble on legal fees while you are trying to heal. Our roots in North Mississippi reach back to 1932, and we represent injured people across the region from our offices in Hernando and Southaven. We are glad to walk you through our fee agreement line by line before you decide anything. Contact Chatham Gilder Howell Pittman for a free consultation. There are no fees unless we recover compensation for you.
