How the Willoughby Law Firm handles requests for consultations.

Also see How best to contact the Willoughby Law Firm for instructions on the various ways to contact us, including our email and telephone procedure.

Where are we located? The bottom of each page of the website shows our address and phone number, and has a link to our Driving Directions page.

See Tim’s Services and Fees for more details of how fees and consults work. Sometimes I can give free consults, but most often I must charge a consult fee. I explain in that article how I do things.

Jump to the following parts of this article or just scroll on down the page:

• What Tim can do for you at a consult
• Telephone consults generally
• What will probably happen during your first contact with my office

What can Tim do for you at a consult?

At minimum, I can evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of your legal position based on your relevant unique circumstances, considering the rules of evidence and civil procedure as well as substantive legal doctrines, with the goal being to develop a strategy for you to try to fix your problem, or to try to get a resolution that is acceptable. I commonly charge for this consult service, but not always. It depends on your circumstances.

For more details of the things that happen at a consult, see generally Deciding what to do - Suing, etc (where I present a long list of the things that lawyers generally consider in sorting out any situation), and also see Tim’s Services and Fees (for a fairly detailed discussion of how I handle specific types of situations and consults, and how I price them).

Telephone Consults are Possible

I am not talking about quick phone conversations here - I am talking about extended legal consults conducted over the telephone, with document review, etc. Most of the time, I will be charging a consult fee just as if you were in the office. Some people appreciate the convenience of a telephone consult, or require a telephone consult due to their circumstances.

For those of you looking to speak with a lawyer to see whether you have a case, you will first have to talk to my assistant. See How to Contact the Willoughby Law Firm for instructions on the various ways to contact us, including our email and telephone procedure. Most of the time we charge consult fees for me to meet with you (in person or on the phone) and sort out your situation.

• I can consult by telephone with anyone in Missouri.
• I sometimes consult by telephone with St. Louisans who have physical limitations that make travel difficult.
• I sometimes consult by telephone with persons who are not in Missouri, but it’s case by case, and you can call my office to talk about it.

If you want to talk about a phone consult, call my office and tell us. See this article for more information on how telephone and long distance consults work: Telephone and Long Distance Consults. If I must charge a consult fee, you can use your MasterCard or Visa. See Tim’s Services and Fees for all the details about the various services I provide and payment options, etc.

What will probably happen during your first contact with my office

If you send an email to my office as we talk about in How to Contact the Willoughby Law Firm, we will either call you back or email you and give you further contact instructions. Some people set up consults through email with us. But most of the time, you and my assistant will end up talking for a few minutes at some point before a consult is scheduled.

When you first talk with us, here’s what usually occurs:

• My assistant will interview you for a few minutes to see what your situation is.
• Based on criteria I set, my assistant may offer you an appointment and will tell you the fee, if a fee will be charged. See Tim’s Services and Fees for more details of how fees are determined.
• Sometimes I will get on the telephone with you for a few minutes and ask you some additional questions before we decide what to do about your inquiry. But this is all case by case. Most of the time, you will be dealing with my assistant until I meet with you for a scheduled appointment.
• I am usually willing to consult with you and help you evaluate your potential case and plan a strategy, even if I am unwilling to take on your case. I will usually charge for the consult. But I reserve the right to decline to consult, even if you are willing to pay a consult fee.
• If my office offers you a consult and you decline to make an appointment, we close out your inquiry, to be re-opened if you contact us again after you have had a chance to think about things.
• As you spend more time exploring this website, you will probably begin to understand the difficulty and uncertainty of employment law cases. In the majority of circumstances, it takes a legal consultation to figure out whether you have a good case worthy of all the effort and expense required to try to obtain an acceptable result. Employment lawyers can go broke giving away the time to help you decide what to do. I talk a lot more about the complexity of employment law and the difficulty of deciding on the right approach to solving your problem in an article called Deciding what to do … suing, etc.

Conclusion:

Remember that my address and telephone number appear at the bottom of every page of this website.

You are welcome to call my office and tell us a little about your situation. Depending on your circumstances, we may be able to offer to meet with you without charging a consultation fee. I regret that we must often request a consult fee, though. See also my article on Deciding what to do - suing, etc, and the links in that article, for more info about how complex employment law consults can get.

If you get voice mail, please leave a detailed message. If we don’t call you back promptly, call us again. This avoids the game of “phone tag” and is more efficient all the way around. Voice mail is a fact of solo and small firm life. Most of the plaintiff’s employment lawyers in town are solo lawyers or are members of very small law firms. I am no exception.

If you send us an email and don’t get a reply, assume we did not get your email. Just call us instead. Once again, please see How to Contact the Willoughby Law Firm.

Thanks for your interest.

Other resources on this site that may be useful:

• How to Contact the Willoughby Law Firm.
• See Deciding what to do - suing, etc, and the links in that article, for much more info about how complex employment law consults can get. Employment law isn’t as straightforward as other areas of law.
• See Tim’s Services and Fees for more details of how fees and consults work.
• Closer to Kansas City than St. Louis? Then see Kansas City Employment Law Inquiries.
• Want a prompt telephone consult? We can consult by telephone, and I explain how this works in my article Telephone and Long Distance Consults.