Attorney Fees: Handling Bankruptcies without Getting There Yourself

By enacting the Bankruptcy Reform Act of 1978, Congress significantly increased the stature and influence of bankruptcy law in our legal system and in society. Consistent with this, Congress sought to improve the quality of legal services rendered to clients in bankruptcy. cases by enhancing the recoverability of attorney fees for such services. In this article, the author treats the criteria a bankruptcy court will likely employ in deciding the reasonableness and recoverability of an attorney fee for services in cases under the Reform Act. The author attempts to show that an attorney who uses some forthought and attention to detail will find representation of a client in a bankruptcy case to be just as remunerative as representation of a client in any other context