We had a deposition done and asked our attorney for a copy, and he said we had to purchase a copy for a fee. We had spent over $800 for the depositon to be done. (Hourly rate of our attorney's time)
1. Is it typical for attoney's to charge the client extra to see (have a copy) the depositon? Or is our attoney playing us?
Just FYI (for comparison)...
When my attorney depo'ed my ex, rather than go through his office and incur admin time my attorney just had me pay the court reporter service directly (this was in addition to the attorney's billable hours for doing the depo).
So I paid $850 to the court reporter for a 120 page document on normal delivery (i.e., 3 weeks).
On another depo, I paid $1300 to the court reporter for a 110 page document on expedited delivery (i.e., 3 days) to rush to the evaluator (because my attorney felt it contained critical stuff).
But if you've already paid for the deposition transcript, I imagine your only cost should be photocopy fees.
DD
He obviously must have a paper copy (else how can he use it later?). Thus he may want photocopy charges. For some reason attorney photocopying is much higher than my local Kinkos ;-)
He asked for additional $500 for the copy of the depo. We had already sunk in $800 for the questioning so, we didn't opt to get a copy. Didn't seem there was anything crucial in it, and it was the ex that requested the depo in first place.
The lawyer that ran the law firm was shady but the lawyer that worked for him (and was appointed to our case) was a nice and good attorney. What can you do.... :-)
It was my understanding that if you want a copy of anything transcribed by the court reporter "someone" has to pay the court reporter for the transcript. At least it is in my state/county. Your attorney may be in the ball park if you have not paid for the report to be "transcribed", and just paid for those who were being depositioned.
>1. Is it typical for attoney's to charge the client extra to
>see (have a copy) the depositon? Or is our attoney playing
>us?
The transcript of a deposition is the "copyright" of the court reporter who wrote it. Many times an attorney will take a deposition, and then decide that the testimony elicted during the depo, doesn't justify buying a copy from the reporter, because nothing useful to your case was obtained.
It's not at all unusual for a transcript to cost $1.50 - $3.00 per page, and several hours of testimony, in double-spaced courier typeface can be many hundreds of pages long.
If you question the price, you can call the court reporter yourself and ask to purchase a copy directly.