It's like this. You just received a bill from your attorney that would choke a horse, and you swear all you did was say, "Hello." A phone call to the attorney gets you a listing of everything that was done for you, and it includes every memo, every phone call, and an outrageous bill for photocopying, message service, and miscellaneous charges.

You are angry, mostly at yourself, and you don't know what to do. You swear you'll never hire another attorney, but you know that isn't true --you need the services they provide to help you conduct business.

The question is not whether you should hire an attorney, there's all kinds of valid reasons to do that. The question is, "How can I control the runaway expenses generated by an attorney?"

Your attorney was trained back in Legal 101 to follow a five step plan in all litigation matters. Those steps are: verification, filing, discovery, preparation and trial or mediation (or both). You have opportunities at each step to dramatically reduce the cost. Here are some ideas to use.

VERIFICATION
Make sure you have every single document, piece of evidence or other item in your hand BEFORE you contact an attorney. Make a case-list by date, and write down everything that happened on each key date. Don't miss anything, not even the bad items!

If your attorney agrees to provide you with a service, even if it's just a review service, anything you say to that attorney from that point on is privileged information, and he or she cannot tell anyone about anything you said, wrote, did, gave or anything else. The better job you do with the facts, the less the attorney has to dig up, and that means less cost to you.

This means YOU should obtain police reports, estimates, gather documents, find memos and locate and catalog all those other items your attorney may need. Make a witness list and be sure to include correct spelling of names, addresses, work and home phone numbers, then include a brief outline of what you think that person can tell about the case. Be sure to include negative people as well as positive; your attorney needs to know what they are going to say so he or she can counter with something else.

FILING
After the attorney has the facts, a paralegal (read that 'high-priced assistant') will look up the law. Usually this will be done by using either LEXIS-NEXIS or WESTLAW, two legal data bases. If your attorney still uses a shelf full of books, find another attorney, he or she is seriously out of date!

When pertinent cases are located, the paralegal writes a summary for the attorney to review. This summary outlines a suggested defense or offense. Your attorney will file under 26 options if there are 26 available. It's sorta' like, "I have to cover all bases so the client (you) doesn't sue me for malpractice." This step costs more to complete the research and write up the papers.

Your opportunity to save at the filing stage is to limit the number and scope of filings. Ask the attorney to limit the search and subsquent filings to the most probable cases, and to not include every one since the invention of law by Og the caveman. This is a judgment call, but if you ask for a cost-benefit analysis of each filing along with an opinion on it's effectiveness, you can minimize cost without jeopardizing your case.

DISCOVERY
This is a wonderful invention! It permits you and your attorney, using the power of the court, to ask the other side exactly what it is they are going to use in court--way before you ever get there. If things look bad for you, your attorney may suggest a settlement right now, thus shortcutting the litigation procedure. On the other hand, if things look bad for the other side, your attorney could demand a settlement from them, again shortening the process.

You can save money here if you will ask the attorney for your options, then ask that the cost-benefit of each option be spelled out. You may find you don't want to proceed if winning would cost you more than settling. It's not the principal, it's the money!

PREPARATION
Now the paralegals get busy. A defense or offense is outlined, a schedule is written, and all the i's are dotted and t's crossed. There's not much you can do to save money at this stage except for auditing the costs. Your attorney should bill you at a much lower rate for work done by others. Ask for this. You might also question your attorney's cost of reviewing the paralegal's work. If it seems excessive, complain. It's your money.

TRIAL
Hopefully you won't have to go to trial. At any time after discovery, (actually anytime at all, but especially after discovery) you have the right to make a settlement with the other side. Don't let your attorney go to arbitration or trial without exploring what the other side figures is an equitable settlement. Trials cost big bucks, and once again, it's your money the attorney will be spending. See if you can settle the matter before bringing in a Judge and Jury.

If you end up having to go to trial, be prepared to spend a bundle. If you have performed your due diligence, your attorney has provided you with a cost estimate. Figure you will spend about 50% more that this.

REQUEST A PROPOSAL
And you thought proposals were only for business! Actually, the practice of law IS A BUSINESS, so ask your attorney for a proposal which outlines each step of their involvement along with expected results, who will provide the services, where and when, and the cost of that service. If your attorney is reluctant to do this for you, find another attorney. There are plenty of lawyers out there, and many of them are hungry for business. Once again it's your money!