Getting Attorneys fees for Collecting on Your Judgment

You may already know that getting a judgment doesn’t mean actually getting any money. You still have to collect on that judgment. While some Defendants may pay what the court orders grudgingly but quickly, other Defendants either can’t or won’t pay a judgment entered against them.

That means that you may need to do some post judgment collection work, finding assets, garnishing wages, maybe even doing depositions, to see where assets that you can collect on may be located.

What About Your Attorneys Fees?

But will you get your attorneys fees for that? Even if the original judgment included attorneys fees—that doesn’t automatically mean that you’ll get attorneys fees, for all the time and expense that comes with collecting on that judgment.

And even if you had a contract that said that you were entitled to attorneys fees, that isn’t automatically interpreted as allowing you to get attorneys fees for your post judgment collection efforts.

This is, by the way, one reason to include just this in your contracts—not just the standard “prevailing party” attorneys fee provisions, but also, contractual provisions that provide you attorneys fees in the event that you have to engage in post judgment collections.

What if You Had no Contract?

Assuming your contract didn’t have this provision, and you do have to engage in post judgment collection activity, what then when it comes to attorney’s fees?

Florida law does allow a court to award a party attorneys fees for its post judgment collections. However, the law is written in the permissive, in that the court can but doesn’t have to award these attorneys fees.

That means that you will have to convince a court to award post judgment fees.

How Difficult is the Collection?

Although the law sets no written standard for when a court should and should not award attorneys fees for post judgment collections, as a general rule, courts have awarded fees when the post judgment collection is difficult or when the judgment debtor has taken steps to evade collection.

So, in situations where a debtor hides assets or perhaps engaged in fraudulent transfers, or where a business is involved and assets have been commingled—all situations that can take extensive time for a judgment creditor to figure out—courts have been more willing to award attorneys fees.

Sometimes, the judgment debtor may have exemptions that the debtor tries to apply (in cases involving consumer debt, where most collection exemptions apply). Some of these may be challenged by the judgment holder, who denies that the exemptions apply.

You May Have to Wait to Find Out

Unfortunately there is often no way to know beforehand whether you will have a tough time collecting on a judgment, and if you do, whether the court will think the situation is complex enough to warrant an award of post judgment attorneys fees.

If you have problems collecting on a judgment, let us help. Call our Fort Lauderdale business lawyers at Sweeney Law P.A. at 954-440-3993 today.

Sources:

casetext.com/statute/florida-statutes/title-vi-civil-practice-and-procedure/chapter-57-court-costs/section-57115-execution-on-judgments-attorneys-fees-and-costs#:~:text=Section%2057.115%20%2D%20Execution%20on%20judgments%3B%20attorney’s%20fees%20and%20costs%20(,with%20execution%20on%20a%20judgment.

casetext.com/statute/florida-statutes/title-xli-statute-of-frauds-fraudulent-transfers-and-general-assignments/chapter-726-fraudulent-transfers/section-726108-remedies-of-creditors/analysis?citingPage=1&sort=relevance