Oklahoma Bar Association Ethics Opinions
Free plain-English summaries of legal ethics opinions issued by the Oklahoma Bar Association, with full citations and source links on every page.
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Can a lawyer pay client court costs and fines with a rewards credit card and keep the points, and must the lawyer disclose this to the client?
Yes, with conditions. The committee concluded that using a rewards credit card to pay client court costs or fines and keeping the points is ethically allowable if done consistently with Rule 1.7; whet…
Can a fee contract set the lawyer's contingent percentage on the combined total of the damages award and a statutory attorney's fee award?
Yes, within limits. The committee concluded a lawyer may contract for a contingent percentage of the aggregate of damages and statutory attorney's fees if the agreement meets the 50% statutory cap and…
Can a contingent-fee agreement base the lawyer's percentage on the combined total of the damages award and statutory attorney's fees?
Yes, within limits. The committee concluded a lawyer may contract for a contingent percentage of the aggregate of damages and statutory attorney's fees if the agreement meets the 50% statutory cap and…
Can a plaintiff's lawyer agree in advance to indemnify the client against attorney's fees and costs the client would owe if the defendant prevails?
No. The committee concluded that an advance agreement to indemnify a client against attorney's fees and costs awarded to a prevailing defendant is not an 'advance' permitted by Rule 1.8(e), and is bar…
Is a non-refundable retainer always a violation of the Oklahoma Rules of Professional Conduct?
No, not per se. The committee concluded that nothing in the Rules flatly bars an advance fee labeled non-refundable, but in an hourly-fee contract for future services such a clause is unenforceable an…
Can a lawyer put a mandatory binding-arbitration clause in a retainer agreement covering fee, malpractice, and other disputes?
Yes, with conditions. The committee concluded that nothing in the Rules prohibits a mandatory arbitration clause covering fee disputes, malpractice, and other claims under the retainer, provided the l…
Can a lawyer take a contingent percentage of the client's own medical-payments (med-pay) insurance when the insurer hasn't disputed coverage?
Not as a blanket matter, and often not. The committee concluded it is not per se unreasonable, but a contingent percentage appropriate for a third-party recovery would probably be excessive and unreas…
With client consent, may a lawyer have the interest on client trust funds paid to a charitable or trade-association tax-exempt entity instead of to the state IOLTA program?
Only partly. The committee concluded that, with the client's written consent after full disclosure, a lawyer could cause interest on nominal or short-held client funds to be paid to a third-party enti…
May a lawyer charge a contingent fee in a divorce case, tied to obtaining the decree or to the property and alimony the client recovers?
No. The committee, readopting a 1932 opinion, concluded that a contingent fee contract in a divorce case is against public policy and void, because it gives the lawyer a personal interest in preventin…
May a lawyer take a mortgage or security interest in a client's property that is the subject of the litigation to secure payment of the lawyer's fee?
Yes. The committee concluded that a mortgage or security interest taken only to secure a reasonable fee is a legally permissible lien, not a prohibited 'proprietary interest' under DR 5-103(A)(1), eve…
May a lawyer take a mortgage or security interest in a client's property that is the subject of the litigation to secure payment of the lawyer's fee?
Yes. The committee concluded that a mortgage or security interest taken only to secure a reasonable fee is a legally permissible lien, not a prohibited 'proprietary interest' under DR 5-103(A)(1), eve…
Can a lawyer serve as both the executor of an estate and the attorney for that estate, and collect a fee for each role?
Yes to both. The committee concluded a lawyer may serve in the dual capacity of executor and attorney for the same estate, and may be paid a fee for each position, provided the lawyer complies with th…
When a client asks for their file after the representation ends, what must the lawyer hand over, and who pays the copying cost?
Where no fee is in dispute, the committee concluded the lawyer must return everything the client supplied and the materials the client paid for that benefit the client, but not work created for the la…
In a divorce, must the plaintiff's lawyer disclose a retainer already paid when asking the court to order the defendant to pay temporary attorney fees, and refund it if the court's award covers the whole fee?
Yes. The committee concluded that a lawyer seeking court-ordered temporary attorney fees in a domestic case must disclose any retainer or fee advance already received, and if the court's award is inte…
May a county bar association sponsor a plan letting clients pay legal fees with a bank credit card?
The committee concluded a bar-association-sponsored credit-card fee financing plan is not improper merely because fees are paid through a credit card, but it could not approve the unsubmitted plan and…
May an attorney who has obtained a default divorce for a client refuse to file or furnish the formal decree until the client pays the fee?
No. The committee concluded that refusing to file or furnish a divorce decree until the fee is paid is professionally improper, because preparing and filing the formal decree is something the attorney…
May a lawyer have his wife post a client's bond, take a fee for referring clients to a bondsman, or run property through a bondsman to leave a bond insecure?
No to all three. The committee concluded a lawyer cannot do indirectly through his wife what he is barred from doing directly; that taking a referral fee from a bondsman is unethical under Canons 6 an…
May an attorney retained by a trade association committee accept a circular inviting individual members to call him for advice on their own problems and to remit his fees directly to him?
No. The committee concluded that a circular inviting individual members to consult the association's counsel about their own affairs violates Canon 35, and that having members pay the attorney directl…
Does a lawyer who habitually offers legal services for less than the minimum fee schedule violate the Canons of Professional Ethics?
The committee concluded that a lawyer who habitually and notoriously underbids the minimum fee schedule violates Canons 7 and 12, because chronic underbidding amounts to soliciting business and encroa…
May a finance company's lawyer arrange and pay for its debtor's bankruptcy so the debt survives, and may the debtor's own lawyer take that payment?
No. The committee concluded the arrangement indicates a Canon 6 violation; the finance company's lawyer cannot also represent the debtor, the debtor's lawyer accepting the company's payment cannot giv…
May a lawyer take over a case from the client's prior lawyer, and who decides the prior lawyer's fee?
Yes. The committee concluded a client has the absolute right to discharge counsel and substitute another, so a lawyer who did not solicit the matter does nothing unethical by accepting it; the dischar…
Will the bar opine on whether a lawyer-executor may also charge the estate an attorney's fee for his legal work?
The Board declined to opine. It concluded the question of whether a lawyer-executor may charge an attorney's fee on top of his executor's fee is a matter of legal rights for the court, not professiona…
Can a salaried in-house lawyer collect statutory attorney's fees in his employer's foreclosures and turn them over to the employer?
No. The Board concluded that a salaried lawyer collecting foreclosure attorney's fees and turning them over to the loan-company employer is an improper division of fees with a non-lawyer under Rule 36…
Can a lawyer on a monthly retainer or salary from a loan company collect the attorney fees stipulated in the company's notes and turn those fees over to the company?
The Board of Governors concluded no. Whether the lawyer was on a monthly retainer or salaried, returning collected attorney fees to the loan company was an improper division of fees with a non-lawyer …
Can a lawyer who collects a contractual attorney fee in a mortgage foreclosure keep part of it and remit the balance to the client?
The Board of Governors concluded no. An arrangement under which the lawyer kept two-thirds of the foreclosure attorney fee and remitted one-third to the client was a division of fees with a non-lawyer…
Can a lawyer arrange for estate appraisers to undervalue property to dodge inheritance tax, and bill for that effort?
No. The Board concluded that arranging a deliberately low appraisal to avoid inheritance tax is a fraud on the county court and the State subjecting the lawyer to disbarment, and he may not consider t…
Can a lawyer fund an indigent client's litigation expenses on a contingent-fee basis when the client likely cannot repay?
No. The Board concluded that Rule 44 lets a lawyer advance expenses only subject to definite reimbursement; financing an indigent client's litigation with no real prospect of repayment is improper cha…
Could a lawyer accept a retainer and charge a reasonable fee to help a person obtain a leave of absence, parole, or pardon?
Yes. Adopting ABA Opinion 61, the Board concluded a lawyer may accept a reasonable fee for representing a convict in a parole or pardon application, subject to the rules of professional conduct: no so…
Could a local bar association adopt a binding schedule of minimum fees that its members had to follow?
The Board recommended against any such schedule, reasoning that an obligatory minimum-fee schedule conflicted with Rule 14 (Canon 12) factors and with the independence required of the profession. This…
Could the lawyers who obtained an administrator's appointment for a creditor client also represent the administrator in recovering estate property while still representing the creditor's claim?
The Board concluded the lawyers could represent the administrator in the recovery suit (with court-approved compensation), but doing so disqualified them from also representing any claimant against th…
Could a lawyer charge and collect a contingent fee from a workers' compensation claimant that exceeded the fee the Industrial Commission allowed?
The Board concluded that collecting from the proceeds of a workers' compensation award an attorney fee greater than the amount the Industrial Commission allowed would subject the lawyer to disciplinar…
Can a new lawyer take over a case from a lawyer the client wants to fire, and can the new lawyer be hired to carry out the discharge?
The Board concluded a successor lawyer should not accept employment for the purpose of discharging the first lawyer (the client must do that), but may properly take over the case once the client has d…
Can a lawyer represent taxpayers in a test suit against a city when the city itself will pay the taxpayers' attorney fees and court costs?
The Board concluded it would not be unethical if the taxpayers know the city is paying the fees, a full and frank disclosure is made in open court, and the lawyer does not take part in a collusive jud…
Can a lawyer advance court costs for a client who cannot afford the filing deposit?
The Board concluded that under Rule 44 a lawyer may not agree to bear the expenses of litigation, but may in good faith advance expenses as a matter of convenience, subject to reimbursement by the cli…
Can a lawyer charge a contingent fee in a divorce case, tied to securing the divorce and to the property or alimony obtained?
The Board concluded no. Contingent-fee contracts in divorce cases are void as against public policy, because they give the lawyer a personal interest in preventing reconciliation, and a divorce is not…
In a fifty-percent contingent-fee case, must litigation costs be deducted before the fee is split, and can a lawyer take fifty percent of the gross recovery while the client pays all costs?
The Board suggested that costs should be deducted from the gross recovery first and the residue split, because the statute caps the fee at fifty percent of the net amount; a contract giving the lawyer…
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Legal ethics opinions from the Oklahoma Bar Association interpret the rules of professional conduct for working lawyers, in response to inquiries from members and committees. They are not binding like court discipline decisions, but courts and discipline boards treat formal opinions as substantial guidance on how the rules apply. Every opinion above has a plain-English question and short answer, plus a link to the original source on the bar's site.