How to Keep Your Client When Litigation Isn’t the Answer

Every litigation attorney encounters the circumstance at one time or another: a long-standing client approaches you with a stubborn, both-sides-believe-they’re-right matter for which the many costs of litigation, and probably even getting to mediation, will be unreasonable compared to the limited money at stake. How can you deliver real and economic justice to the client?…

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Avoiding Arbitration by Sonya Sigler

It would be great if arbitration were THE alternative answer to litigating in courts with over crowded dockets and ever shrinking budgets, but arbitration hasn’t turned out to be that kind of panacea over the last 40 years. I was stopped at a traffic light behind a vehicle with a license plate that said ARBATR8.…

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Contract Management Best Practices: What Are You Willing To Risk?

Whether a business manages hundreds of contracts per year or only a few for key relationships, contracts are a fundamental component of risk management for every company. Contracts define business relationships and transactions.  Moreover, how a business mitigates contract and dispute risks profoundly affects its financial health and reputation as a business partner.

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How much DOES discovery cost?

Litigation can be expensive and one of the largest expenses of any litigation is finding information. Of those dollars devoted to discovery and investigation costs, producing electronically stored information (ESI) alone can comprise 60-80% of those costs. Drilling down into those costs and taking a closer look at what it costs to produce ESI, according…

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Recently Resolved: Where is My Penalty Payment?

The Dispute Our latest Resolve involved a laboratory services contract that specified the payment of about $28,000 in penalties if the customer delayed the start date of the study. As is often the case, both sides believed they were in the right, actually had good reasons for believing it, and felt the other side was…

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How California Court Budget Cuts Could Affect Your Business

California is in the third year of cuts, and the state’s courts are taking a $660 million hit: $350 million in the latest budget cuts and another $310 million originally earmarked for court construction that is being diverted to the State’s General Fund. Complex litigation departments which handle business trials will be closed or cut…

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