Myth: My BC Divorce Lawyer is Only After My Money.
Lawyers being greedy and only caring about money is not a new concept to anyone. Lawyers are often portrayed in media (see Suites and the Good Wife) as rich, money-hungry bullies who sometimes bend the truth and make a world of promises to you but in reality and at the end, leave you high and dry and a in worse situation than you were in before getting a lawyer.
Well, news flash, in the real world and in the family law realm, your Vancouver Family attorneys and BC divorce lawyers do not need your money, do not like conflicts and often actually care greatly about your case.
Here are my answers to the top 3 misconceptions about the BC Divorce Lawyer:
Table of Contents
1. There are Too Many Divorce Clients and Not Enough BC Divorce Lawyers
In other words, we often get enough business and are constantly too busy to place all our hopes and focus on one client and ensure they pay us as much as they can.
Family and divorce law are recession-proof, constant and so difficult that the majority of lawyers refuse to even take part in doing family law no matter how high the income may be.
J.P. Boyd, in his article on Lawyer’s Weekly, said as follows:
Arguments predicated on lawyers’ interest in conflict are a canard playing on the cliché of lawyer avarice…Most people cannot afford to finance litigation through to trial, and family law is a recession-proof enterprise whose practitioners rarely suffer for a want of business. Lawyers do not need to stoke their clients’ enmity to make a living.
Divorce has been statistically proven as the second most stressful event of anyone’s life. Dealing with divorce on a daily basis and handling multiple divorces at a time results in anxiety, negativity and sometimes taking too much mistreatment and abuse from the opposing party who thinks the BC divorce lawyer has a personal interest in destroying their lives, and sometimes even the client who cannot trust the divorce lawyer because he/she has been betrayed in his/her own relationship to have to go through a divorce.
The last thing most family and divorce lawyers would want to do is to unreasonably ask the client who is in a difficult stage of life to hand over their entire life’s savings to the lawyer. This takes me to my next point:
2. The BC Divorce Lawyer is often Not Interested in Conflict and Fighting
Even if conflict resulted in more income for the divorce lawyer, most lawyers would not prefer money over conflict for many reasons, the most important of which is the psychological toll conflict plays on the lawyer’s psyche. Lawyers by nature are problem solvers. If they do not solve problems or advance unreasonable and conflictual positions, the court will grant penalties and costs against their case. This is damaging to the BC divorce lawyer’s reputation and certainly leaves the client dissatisfied. Lawyers rely on their reputation and word of mouth for the health of their practice. Short term gain of asking a client to pay for conflict is not worth the long term pain of having a bad reputation and less clients.
J.P. Boyd goes on to say:
The vast majority of my colleagues in the family law bar will not advance unreasonable positions, diligently work toward just results and promote resolution other than by litigation wherever litigation can be avoided. Even if this was not the case, adherents of this position fail to recognize that lawyers generally have little to gain from promoting conflict.
3. A BC Divorce Lawyer’s Work is Difficult and Requires Constant Brain Power
Vancouver Family Lawyer’s fees are another hot topic and clients often understandably question the fairness of the fees they pay the lawyer. They wonder why they would have to pay at least a couple hundred dollars for a letter to the opposing side or thousands of dollars for court applications and trials.
Even a one-sentence letter to the opposing side requires careful thinking, problem-solving, strategy and protecting the client’s interests. Family law cases require careful analysis and strategy. It is not just the letter you are paying for, it is the (sometimes) hours of thinking, applying the law to the facts of your case and ensuring you are protected before the lawyer’s finger hits the keyboard to write a letter to the opposing side. That letter can be the winning ingredient to your case at trial so it’s important that we work diligently on all aspects of your case.
BC Family Law is difficult and time-consuming. We do our best to guide you through this sometimes painful and slow process and ensure your rights are protected/you receive finality.
It is always better to first meet with your lawyer and get a feel of the person he/she is. Believe it or not, most of us just want the best for you and want to be fair, and not overly, compensated.
Ronak Leena Yousefi is a BC Family Lawyer and Vancouver Divorce Lawyer. For questions or suggestions, contact us at [email protected] or 604-974-YLAW.
This article is for information only and does not constitute legal advice. It does not create a lawyer–client relationship with YLaw or any of its lawyers. Laws and policies change, and information here may not reflect the most current legal developments. For full details, please contact us to obtain advice about your specific situation.