If clients become involved in legal proceedings they will be expected to pay for their provider’s professional time and the professional time of any supervisor the provider is currently contracted with, even if called to testify by another party. Because of the difficulty of legal involvement, clients can expect to have a higher hourly rate for legal work than usual consulting fees. Should a client or their legal counsel desire their clinician’s presence in court, the fee structure for court is as follows:
- All preparatory time (e.g., reviewing the file, court preparation with attorney, communications related to preparation) is charged at $400/ hour/per provider (this includes supervisors).
- Court time, for all time required out of the office (i.e., including drive time) and/or scheduled out that your clinician otherwise would not be able to see clients is charged at $400/hour/per provider (this includes supervisors). A minimum of two hours is automatically billed for each provider (this includes supervisors). Any time spent after the initial two hours will be rounded to the next 15-minute interval. In the event that court appearance is canceled or rescheduled, 30% of the retainer will be lost.
- Due to the inability to schedule other activities during an anticipated court appearance, a $800 per provider retainer to be paid in advance is required.
- As a general policy, clinicians cannot be available “on-call,” as being called to come to court at the last minute in that fashion is too disruptive to their practice, and not fair to clients that otherwise would be scheduled that day.
- Generally speaking, insurance may not cover this service, therefore all fees may be due out of pocket.