Realtime Cancellation Fees

[Susan Magee]

Does the firm you work with charge a fee to the client if they order a realtime feed and then cancel it after you've already arrived on the depo and are ready to hook up and write realtime?

[Susan Magee]

Thanks for your input, ladies. Like you, Kristi, I never charge a cancellation fee if the problem hooking up is on the reporter's end, and most of the firms I work with also charge a cancellation fee.

The reason I ask is one of the firms I work with who usually charges a fee when realtime is ordered and not used is now calling it into question. It came up a few times for me last month, and they wanted me to explain what happened on each job. One of the reasons was because the attorney changed his mind; the other was the attorney needed a password to access LiveNote and didn't want to wait for his IT guy to give it to him. In both instances I did all the prep work for a realtime depo - arrived early, scrambled to put in as many case dictionary entries as I could and set up all the equipment so I was ready to go.

At first the manager at the court reporting firm (who has never questioned this fee before) said those were not "justifiable" reasons to charge a fee and deleted those fees from my check, but I stood my ground, and they finally said they were going to pay me for them. Besides it being the reporter's fault that you can't connect, can you think of any other justifiable reasons for not being paid the cancellation fee?

I believe reporters should get a cancellation fee for realtime ordered and not used for many reasons. Here are just a few:

1. When a realtime job is put on the calendar, the calendar coordinator must schedule realtime reporters on those jobs only and coordinate the schedule around that accordingly.

2. Realtime jobs are harder to cover than non-realtime jobs.

3. Realtime reporters arrive at the deposition earlier than usual (at least 30 minutes) to prepare for the hookup and make sure an adequate case glossary is in place so the realtime feed is clean.

4. Realtime reporters have more job opportunities with other firms to take realtime work, so if the realtime request is canceled, chances are we turned down another realtime job to cover this one.

Thanks for listening to my two cents' worth. I appreciate your feedback :)

[Kristi]

My firm charges a realtime cancellation fee if they decide not to hook up. If it's the reporter's fault, (can't connect, doesn't have all the right adapters for that attorney, etc.) then we don't charge a cancellation fee.

[Kyung]

Most of the firms I work for charge $50/half day, $100/full day (over 4 hours) if the attorney orders and hookup doesn't actually occur due to whatever reason, the attorney doesn't have the right kind of port/the attorney's laptop is not working, whatever.

[Patricia Babits]

I don't have experience with this.
However, I did read about it on another reporting message board. All the reporters there said they definitely charge if realtime is ordered and then cancelled when they show up.

[Patricia Babits]

I don't know about this from personal experience. However, it was a topic on another reporting message board, and all the reporters over there said hell yeah, if realtime is ordered, and they bring all the equipment, they charge.