The Qualities To Look For When Retaining An Attorney For An Auto-Accident Case

Interviewer: If you were in an accident, how would you find the right attorney? Which people look forward to determine who’s right for them and who’s not?

Richard Sailer: I feel that the most important thing is to be honest with the client upfront, and to make sure that we’re all on the same page as to what expectations are. I get calls a lot of times from people who have other attorneys and what I’ve noticed is that there are attorneys out there that will promise the client the world, just to get the case. They’ll tell the client, ‘hey your case is worth a 150,000 dollars, I’m going to get you a brand new car, I’m going to do this, that and the other thing for you’ and they create false expectations, just because they want to get the client to retain them.

 

Some Attorneys Will Say Anything To Get A Person To Retain Their Services

So they’ll basically say anything to get the client to sign up with their office, even if those things may not be probable. Because I get those calls from other people saying, ‘hey when I first signed up with the attorney he told me I was going to get x, y and z, and now he’s telling me I’m getting a, b and c, and what’s going on here?’ And on further inquiry I’ll ask about the facts and the circumstances and the specifics of the case, and I’ll have to agree that the case is worth a, b and c and not x, y and z. And then the clients were upset because the attorney wasn’t honest with them upfront, and gave them false expectations just to secure the client. I think that happens very frequently in this industry.

 

A Competent Personal Injury Attorney Handles All The Aspects on Behalf of His Client

Interviewer: What else about you makes you different versus other accident attorneys out there?

Richard Sailer: I’d say that we’re a full service firm in terms of full services that we do handle the property damage claim, we handle the rental reimbursements, we dip the medical records, we gather the police report, we handle the case from day 1. I know there are other firms out there, and again I’ve taken over cases that had been handled by other attorneys, where the attorney well tell them, ‘we don’t want to deal with the car’, ‘we don’t want to deal with the rental’. I’ve even had clients call me saying that their attorney had told them to pick up their own police report; they can’t find which agency has it. We do all the leg work for them; I don’t expect the client to do anything other than just go to their medical appointments and get themselves healthy, and get back on with their life. So it’s a – we handle a full service from day 1 throughout the conclusion of the case. And we try to minimize the client’s inconvenience of having to put the claim in – we try to make it as smooth for them as possible.

 

Some People Try To Pursue Personal Injury Litigation When They Are In Fact Not Injured

Interviewer: What makes a good client versus one that you wouldn’t want to deal with, in your eyes? What are you looking for in a client?

Richard Sailer: I’m looking for somebody that has realistic expectations. I’m looking for somebody who is actually injured. I’m looking for somebody that was actually in the accident. It’s probably easier for me to tell you what I’m not looking for. Sometimes people will call up and they’ll say, ‘hey somebody hit me and I’m okay but I think if I get an attorney involved, you can get me some money’ and obviously I’ve got enough clients that are really injured and really need my help, versus getting involved with people that are just trying to make a case, just to make a case.