Lawyer Fees
How Much Do Lawyers Charge?
While most firms won’t say, Lazarus Legal offers transparent fixed-fee arrangements for commercial matters, hourly billing for complex advisory work, and clear cost structures for litigation.
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Quick Answer
Australian lawyers generally charge in one of three ways:
- Fixed fees apply to defined work like contracts and trade mark filings, where the price is agreed before the work starts.
- Hourly billing applies to ongoing or open-ended work, with commercial rates commonly sitting between roughly $400 and $700 plus GST per hour, depending on the seniority of the lawyer.
- Litigation costs combine hourly fees with large upfront payments into a trust account to cover court fees, expert reports and barristers’ fees.
Which structure applies to you depends on whether the work has a clear finish line, whether it is ongoing, or whether it is contested. The rest of this page explains each one and what makes the bill go up or down.
Why Most Law Firms Avoid Upfront Pricing
Most Sydney law firms will not publish pricing on their website, and there is a legitimate reason for that. The Legal Profession Uniform Law (NSW) requires that any cost estimate reflect the actual facts of your matter, not a generic figure. A published price list would either be inaccurate for most readers or so heavily qualified that it told you nothing useful.
That said, we think it is still possible to explain how a bill is built before you engage anyone. The three billing structures below cover how we charge lawyer fees across all of that work.
Our Lawyer Fees Structure
Fixed Fees
We offer fixed fees for scoped work with a clear finish line, such as contracts, agreements, and trade mark filings. The price is agreed before the work starts, with one round of amendment included.
Hourly Billing
We offer hourly rates for ongoing or open-ended work. This includes advice, negotiations, anything where the time depends on how the matter unfolds. Blended rate is around $550 plus GST per hour.
Litigation Cost
For contested and court matters, we offer hourly fees plus large disbursements paid from trust. Court fees, expert reports, and barristers’ fees push the balance up.
Important Legal Terms To Know
Some of these terms appear on legal bills and in engagement letters across the profession, not just at Lazarus Legal. It is worth familiarising yourself with them before you sign anything with any firm.
Round of Amendment
After we send you a draft, you mark up all your changes in one go and send it back, and we revise it once. That is one round. Sending changes piecemeal over several days counts as several rounds.
Scope Creep
Scope creep refers to work that was not part of the original brief but gets added as the matter progresses. Common examples include adding a new party, requesting extra clauses after a draft is finalised, or introducing a fresh idea that effectively restarts the drafting process.
Blended Rate
A blended rate is the average hourly rate that applies when a senior and a junior lawyer work together on your matter. The senior sets the strategy, while the junior handles the work that does not require senior input. The result is lower costs without any drop in quality.
Monies in Trust
Monies in trust is money you pay us in advance, which we hold in a separate, regulated trust account on your behalf. It remains your money until we have completed the work and issued a bill against it.
Disbursement
A disbursement is an out-of-pocket cost we pay on your behalf, separate from our professional fees. These include court filing fees, search fees, expert reports, and barristers’ fees. All disbursements are passed on to you at cost, with nothing added.
Costs Disclosure
A costs disclosure is a written notice we are required to give you under section 174 of the Legal Profession Uniform Law (NSW) before substantive work begins. It sets out our cost estimate, explains how our fees are calculated, and informs you of your right to question the bill.
Party-and-Party Costs
Party-and-party costs are what a court orders the losing party to pay toward the winner’s legal costs. In NSW, this amount is typically around 60 to 70 per cent of what the winning party has actually paid their own lawyer, not the full amount.
AML Tranche 2
From 1 July 2026, firms carrying out certain types of legal work are required to verify the identity of their clients under new anti-money laundering obligations. In practice, this means we will ask for identity documents at the start of some matters. Further detail is set out below.
STRUCTURE 01
Fixed Fees
Fixed fees apply to work with a defined scope and a clear finish line. Most of our commercial work falls into this category: drafting and reviewing contracts, shareholders agreements, employment agreements, terms and conditions, non-disclosure agreements, and standard business structuring.
The cost is agreed before work starts. You know what you are paying, you can plan around it, and neither side is watching the clock.
$1,650
+ GST
What One Round of Amendment Means
A fixed-fee quote for drafting assumes one round of amendment: we deliver a draft, you return consolidated changes in a single pass, and we revise it once before issuing the final version.
One round is the limit because scope needs to stay fixed for the fee to stay fixed.
Where we can see upfront that the matter will involve several stakeholders or active counterparty negotiation, we will either quote the first draft as fixed and the negotiation as hourly, or quote a wider fixed fee that allows for additional rounds. Either way, the arrangement is confirmed before work starts.
How to Prepare for Less Amendments
The most common cause of extra rounds is uncertainty about what the document needs to do before drafting starts. The clearer the brief, the closer the first draft lands. Before our first call, it is worth working through these questions.
- If this document could do everything you needed, what would that look like? Describe the ideal outcome in your own words.
- What is the situation you most want to be protected from? The scenario that keeps you up at night is usually the one the document most needs to address.
- Has something gone wrong before, for you or for someone you know in your industry? Real past problems are the best guide to what the document needs to cover.
- What is the worst realistic outcome if the other side doesn't deliver, and what would you want to happen if they don't?
- Is there anything specific to your industry or how you operate that a standard template would miss?
- What matters more here: getting it signed quickly, or getting every protection in place even if it takes longer?
Making Your One Round Count
When the draft arrives, read it twice: once for the overall shape, once for the detail. If others in your business need to review it, collect all their comments before sending anything back. Return everything in a single consolidated pass.
- Does this reflect the deal we actually agreed?
- Does it cover the situation I'm most worried about?
- What does it say about the other side not holding up their end?
- Is there anything here I don't understand?
STRUCTURE 02
Hourly Billing
Hourly billing is the right structure when the scope cannot be pinned down at the start. Ongoing advice, complex negotiations, regulatory questions that change shape as more facts come out, and disputes that are still forming all fall here. The common thread is that the time required depends on how the matter unfolds, and that cannot honestly be quoted as a fixed price.Â
Lawyer Fees Per Hour in Australia
Commercial hourly rates in Australia commonly run from around $400 plus GST for a junior solicitor to $700 or more for a senior practitioner, with specialist and senior partners charging higher again. The rate on its own tells you little, though, because what matters is how many hours the work takes and who does them.Â
The profession has been moving away from rigid six-minute time billing, and that shift has sped up in 2026. The Law Society of NSW has been pushing firms toward fairer models, and the principle is simple: a bill should match the work that was done, not get rounded up by the clock.
Our approach is simple. Where we bill by time, we record it honestly. A two-minute call is a two-minute call. The time on the bill is the time we worked.Â
The Senior and Junior Blend
Most matters of any size run on a mix of senior and junior lawyers. The senior sets the strategy, drafts the parts that need experience, and signs off on what goes out. The junior handles the rest: reviewing material, first drafts of routine sections, correspondence, searches. That mix is what keeps a matter affordable without losing quality.
Across a typical commercial matter, our blended rate works out to around $550 plus GST per hour. A heavily senior-led matter sits above that; a mostly junior-led one with senior oversight sits below. Before we start, we tell you who is working on your file and at what rate.Â
Litigation Costs
Litigation is the most expensive work we do. The costs involved are worth understanding before you decide to proceed, because the real cost of running a dispute to a hearing is usually higher than people expect.
Why The Trust Balance Is So High
Litigation disbursements are paid before the step they relate to, not after. The trust balance has to cover these upfront costs without requiring a top-up every few weeks. Common upfront disbursements include:
| Disbursement | When It Is Paid |
|---|---|
| Court filing fees | Day the claim is filed |
| Expert reports | At the start, not on delivery |
| Barrister's brief fee | When the brief is sent |
| Barrister's hearing fees | Before hearing days commence |
Barrister's Fees
Solicitors and barristers are separate branches of the profession. Solicitors manage the file. Barristers are independent specialists briefed for specific court appearances or complex legal opinions.
Because barristers are independent of our firm:
- Their fees are not our fees
- We pay them from your trust account and pass the cost on as a disbursement at cost, with nothing added
- The figure on your bill for counsel is exactly what the barrister charged
Court filing fees, lodgement fees, and search fees work the same way. They are set and collected by the court, and recorded against your matter at cost.
What You Receive Before We Start
Before opening a litigation file, we provide a written costs disclosure under section 174 of the Legal Profession Uniform Law (NSW). If the matter develops and our cost estimate changes, we provide an updated disclosure in writing.
- Our estimate of total costs
- How our fees are calculated
- The main disbursements expected at this stage
- The trust amount required upfront
Not sure which one fits your matter?
Fifteen minutes on the phone is usually enough to tell you which structure applies and roughly what it costs.Â
holding your money safely
Holding Monies in Trust
On hourly matters, and especially on litigation, we will often ask you to pay money into our trust account before work begins. Trust money is governed by the Legal Profession Uniform Law (NSW) and the Uniform General Rules 2015. The rules around it are strict, and they exist to protect you, not us.Â
Held Separately
Your money sits in a separate, regulated account. We can't use it for our own costs or anyone else's matter.
Billed Before Drawn
Before we take any of it in payment, we send you a bill first. Disbursements come out against an itemised account.
Refunded on Request
Stop using us at any point and whatever we haven't billed against is yours. We have to refund it. That's the law.
AML Tranche 2: What Changes From 1 July 2026
From 1 July 2026, the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act 2006 (Cth) extends to law firms for the first time. This change is known as Tranche 2. AUSTRAC enrolment opened 31 March 2026.
In practice, it means we verify client identity at the start of relevant matters, monitor those matters on an ongoing basis, report suspicious activity to AUSTRAC, and maintain a written program documenting how we manage money laundering risk.
Not every matter is caught. The obligations apply to designated services: work involving trust money, company structuring or transfers, and property transactions. Pure litigation that does not involve trust money generally falls outside it. We will confirm whether your matter is caught at the start of the engagement.
What This Means
When you engage us on a matter that’s caught, we’ll ask for identity documents at the start, verify them, and keep a record. It’s not onerous, but it’s now a legal requirement for every firm, not a preference of ours.
- Ready when you are
Talk to us before you commit to anything
 If you have a job in front of you and want to know what it would cost to do properly, the quickest way to find out is to call. Fifteen minutes is usually enough for us to work out which billing structure fits and give you a realistic estimate before you decide whether to go ahead.
No retainer. No commitment. No surprise bill. Lazarus Legal is a Sydney commercial, business, contract, trade mark and intellectual property firm based in Bondi Junction, acting for clients across New South Wales and nationally.
Questions Clients Often Ask About Lawyer Fees
Why do most law firms not publish their prices?
The Legal Profession Uniform Law (NSW) requires our estimate to reflect the facts of your matter rather than a generic average, and to set out how our fees are worked out before we begin. A published price list would either be wrong for your situation or buried under so many exceptions that it told you nothing. A short conversation gives you a real number tied to what you actually need.Â
If I win my case, does the other side pay my legal fees?
Sometimes, but rarely all of them. The winning side in NSW litigation is usually awarded party-and-party costs, paid by the loser. In practice these cover around 60 to 70 per cent of what you have actually paid your lawyer, not the full amount. The gap between what you owe us and what the other side has to pay is something we explain at the start of any contested matter, because it affects whether going to court makes sense for you.
Are barristers' fees included in your hourly rate?
They are not. Barristers are independent practitioners, not part of our firm, and we brief them on your behalf when a matter needs one. Their fees are passed on to you as a disbursement, at cost, with nothing added. Most commercial work needs no barrister at all. Most contested court matters that reach a hearing do, and we discuss the choice of counsel and the likely cost with you well before the brief goes out.
How does AML Tranche 2 affect engaging a lawyer in 2026?
From 1 July 2026, firms doing certain kinds of work have to verify client identity and keep an eye on the matter as it runs, under the AML/CTF Act. For most clients that means providing identity documents at the start and answering a few questions about where funds are coming from when money moves through trust. Pure litigation often sits outside this. Commercial work, structuring, IP licensing involving payments, and anything property-related is generally inside it.