The fee conversation is where a half-translated intake fails

We are not attorneys and this is not legal advice. Fee agreements are governed by Rule 4-1.5 of the Rules Regulating The Florida Bar, and what your agreement must say is your Bar counsel’s question. This piece is about the moment the fee is explained.

The last step before the signature

Every intake ends at the same place: a person deciding whether to sign a document that describes how they will pay. A contingency percentage and what it is a percentage of. A flat fee and what it covers. An hourly rate with a deposit that has to be replenished. Each of these is simple to a lawyer and new to almost everyone else, and it is explained once, at the consult, in whatever language the consult happened in.

If the intake was bilingual until this moment and English from here on, this is where the Spanish-speaking prospective client drops out. Not loudly. They nod, take the document, and do not come back.

What Rule 4-1.5 already requires

Contingency fee agreements must be in writing and signed, and personal injury contingency agreements come with Florida’s statement of client’s rights. The rule does not require the agreement to be in the client’s language. It does require the client to have been informed, and a document a person cannot read is a weak basis for that. A Spanish version of the agreement, or at least a Spanish explanation sent with it, is the practical answer, and many South Florida firms already have one. The intake system’s job is to send the right version.

What the intake can do about it

• • Capture the expected fee arrangement on the form: contingency, flat fee, hourly, or "not sure." That tells the attorney what to explain before the consult starts.
• • Send the fee explanation, in the language of the intake, before the consultation, as part of the "what to expect" message. A person who has read "no cobramos a menos que recuperemos" once is not hearing it for the first time in the room.
• • Send the engagement agreement in the language the intake was in, or with the Spanish explanation attached, and have the retainer follow-up offer, in Spanish, to walk through it again.
• • Report signed retainers by the language of the first contact. If Spanish inquiries consult at the same rate and sign at a lower one, the fee conversation is the suspect.

The controlling-language clause

Firms that provide a Spanish agreement usually make the English version controlling, and say so in a clause. That clause has to be explained too. A person who signs a Spanish document and later learns the English one governs has a reason to feel handled, whatever the law says. The explanation is one sentence, and the firm’s Spanish templates should carry it.

What it is not

None of this is the intake system giving legal advice or explaining the agreement on the firm’s behalf. The templates carry the firm’s own explanation, approved by the firm’s attorney, in the firm’s words. The system decides only which language to send it in, and it decides that from the first message the person sent.

Questions we get asked about this

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