Is it expensive to hire a personal injury lawyer?

The short version: hiring a personal injury lawyer at Big Dog Law costs nothing up front. We work on contingency, which means our fee is a percentage of the recovery and we only get paid if you do.

How contingency fees actually work

A contingency-fee agreement shifts the financial risk of the case from you to the firm. The firm fronts the work, the experts, the depositions, and the court costs. If we recover compensation for you, the fee is a percentage of that recovery and the costs are reimbursed. If we don’t recover anything, you owe no attorney’s fee, and in most cases you don’t owe the costs either.

• 1

  Free consultation

  We review your case, ask the questions that matter, and tell you honestly whether you have a claim worth pursuing.

• 2

  Written fee agreement

  If we take the case, you sign a written contingency-fee agreement that spells out the percentage and how case costs are handled.

• 3

  We do the work

  Investigation, evidence preservation, demand letters, negotiation, lawsuit and trial if necessary.

• 4

  You get paid

  When the case resolves, the recovery goes into the firm's trust account. Liens, costs, and the attorney fee come out, and your net check is disbursed.

Why this works in your favor

• ✓

  No financial barrier to representation

  If you couldn't afford an injury lawyer, you'd be matched against a billion-dollar insurer with one. Contingency fixes that.

• ✓

  Aligned incentives

  The firm only gets paid if you do — and gets paid more if your recovery is larger. Our interest is your interest.

• ✓

  No surprise invoices

  You won't get a bill in the middle of treatment. You won't be asked to pay for a deposition or an expert mid-case.

• ✓

  Built-in case selection

  Firms that take every case on the volume model burn out fast. Firms that take cases on contingency are choosy — for a reason.

What about case expenses?

Case expenses are different from attorney fees. They are the out-of-pocket costs incurred to build the case — court filing fees, medical record retrieval charges, expert witness fees, deposition transcripts, mediation fees, and so on. These are typically advanced by the firm and reimbursed from the recovery at the end. In a clear case where there’s a strong liability and damages story, costs are usually small relative to the recovery. In a complex case heading to trial, they can be significant — and the firm tells you that before incurring them.