I had never worked with an attorney before, and I was uncomfortable with depositing a $2500 retainer for something as small as a prenup review as I felt I would have little recourse if I were billed for far more hours than I wanted to spend on this review.
I worked with Jamie Kerr on reviewing an existing prenup that my fiancee’s attorney had drafted. I had already reviewed the agreement myself and we had gone through a few revisions with my fiancee’s attorney before I was ready to find my own attorney to do a review for me.
During our initial consult meeting we discussed the retainer and my concerns about how much this would end up costing. I asked that Jamie only spend time on major issues with the document so as to limit time spent on my review. Before agreeing to further services I requested in writing that we not use a retainer and that Jamie not spend more than an hour or so on the review without telling me that this was shaping up to be a much larger task with unexpected issues in the prenup so as to get my approval to spend more time on it. He received approval to move forward without using a retainer and I assumed got the message about how much I wanted to spend on this review.
This is a first class firm that has had my back and resolved issues more than I want to admit! I recommend Bill to everyone.
Went to work and helped me finish my divorce quickly. They were empathetic to my situation and gave me logically advice.
I attempted to call/email Jamie after receiving the bill and let him know my requests to limit the time spent on my review were ignored. Jamie was willing to no-charge about $200 of the $1500+ bill for about six hours but would not make things right by only charging even somewhat close to the amount of time I had requested be spent on my review. After that I felt obligated to share my negative experience with anyone else searching for an attorney in hopes of saving them from a similar experience.
— Clay Bridwell
Beware of being billed for far more hours than you requested.
If you have a smaller task such as reviewing an existing prenup draft, I’d steer clear of this office and find an attorney who will do the work for a flat fee you negotiate ahead of time. I am sure there are options for local attorneys that are far more above board about their costs and that will follow your requests.
I was blindsided when I ended up being billed for almost six hours of work on top of the initial consult fee, so nearly $2000 for a prenup *review*. This is more than double what we paid to have the entire agreement drafted and put through several revisions, and multiple times the $500 range we’d heard of for a prenup review.
I have had the privilege of working with this law firm for the last 7 years with my child custody case. I will never use another attorney in Austin Texas. They are trustworthy, honest, extremely hard working not to mention knowledgeable and well known in the legal community.. Truly one of a kind. I also would like to comment on the staff. Throughout the long battle I have never encountered an attorney or there staff who do not exemplify excellence. They are fabulous and I’m so grateful to have them to answer all my questions.
My custody case took almost 2 years which involved two other attorneys before I found Bill ending in a successful judgement after an all day trial. Bill and his right hand person, Chris, were masterful. I didn't always understand his advice along the way but looking back everything he advised and did was perfect. Bill Powers is hands down the BEST family law firm in the Austin area!
With Jamie we did only one round of review and the agreement did not become any more complicated than what we went over together in the consult meeting. He also ignored my request to inform me that the review was taking longer than I anticipated and to ask how I would like to proceed at that point.
I received a new draft of the agreement from my fiancee’s attorney with changes made based on how we decided to simplify it in the initial consult meeting with Jamie. I did exactly as Jamie requested to help him get through the review more quickly by giving him a redlined version of the new draft with Word’s track changes feature turned on so he could easily see exactly what was changed.
In our initial consult meeting Jamie insisted that he had no way to determine ahead of time how long this review would take. I believe he had enough information after that meeting to inform me that my request to spend another hour or so reviewing it would fall far short of how long he would likely spend on it. Not giving me realistic expectations demonstrated very poor client management.
Law Offices Of William D Powers is a US Lawyer based in Austin, Texas. Law Offices Of William D Powers is located at 8911 N Capital of Texas Hwy, Austin, TX 78759, USA.
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