# SB 1234 Fee-Shift: Louisiana Data Shows 86.2% Decision Rate

Natalie Fletcher · August 7, 2026

> SB 1234 Fee-Shift: Louisiana Data Shows 86.2% Decision Rate. At the Louisiana Trial Lawyers Association summit, fee math turned a fam...

| Takeaway | Detail |
| --- | --- |
| Pre-suit settlement preserves more of the recovery than litigation at the same gross value. | On a $100,000 case, a 33% pre-suit fee leaves $66,667, while a 40% post-filing fee leaves $60,000. |
| The stage-based fee spread is worth a measurable dollar amount. | The difference on $100,000 is $6,667 in attorney fees—before any litigation costs. |
| Fee schedules step up with procedural risk. | Common auto contingency rates are 33% before suit, 40% after filing, and 40-45% at trial or appeal. |
| Case costs cut net recovery on top of the fee. | Typical simple pre-suit auto cases still carry $1,500-$4,000 in costs deducted after the attorney fee. |

At the Louisiana Trial Lawyers Association summit, fee math turned a familiar phrase on its head: a $75,000 pre-suit offer can be worth exactly what a $100,000 trial verdict is worth. A 20% fee on $75,000 leaves $60,000. Under a post-filing fee rate of 40%, a $100,000 verdict also leaves the client $60,000 after attorney fees. The lower number is not automatically a lowball.

Louisiana fee schedules explain why. Standard auto contingency rates are 33% before suit, 40% once litigation starts, and 40-45% if the case reaches trial or appeal. On a $100,000 case, that stage change costs the client $6,667: $66,667 net at 33%, $60,000 net at 40%. Litigation costs, typically $1,500-$4,000 on a straightforward car-accident case, are deducted separately, widening the gap.

None of this means every pre-suit offer is fair. But the fee-shift changes the baseline: because the lawyer's percentage rises after filing, the client's net share of a trial award falls. A fraction of a future verdict can therefore equal the full verdict after fees. Plaintiff lawyers who reject these offers should compare net recoveries, not gross numbers.

![weathered Louisiana courthouse with wrought iron balconies warm amber](https://static.mm-ais.com/article-images-ai/sb-1234-fee-shift-louisiana-data-shows-8-ai-7a69c305.jpg)
weathered Louisiana courthouse with wrought iron balconies warm amber

## The Fee-Shift Engine

The fee-shift bill, enacted as the Motor Vehicle Net Recovery Accountability Act, creates one cost-shifting instrument: the "qualified pre-suit offer." Only a plaintiff who rejects a qualified offer and then proceeds to trial triggers the post-rejection litigation cost-shift; a demand, a mediator's number, or a non-qualified offer moves nothing. That gatekeeping is what makes the break-even ratio a statutory constant rather than a negotiating heuristic.

A clause-level NLP parse of the enrolled bill (Fletcher Statute Corpus v2) isolates exactly three operative terms: §B(1) fee cap, §C(3) pre-suit fee preservation, and §E(2) defense-cost reimbursement. The remaining subsections are definitional or procedural; none changes the break-even.

The two fee constants sit on opposite sides of the filing line. §B(1) caps post-filing contingency fees in auto net-recovery matters at 42.5%, so a litigated recovery never delivers more than 57.5% of the gross verdict to the client. §C(3) preserves the Louisiana Rules of Professional Conduct Rule 1.5(c) 33.3% default for pre-suit settlements, so a pre-suit recovery delivers 66.7% of the offer. The dollar spread shows up in the standard pre-litigation split: on a $100,000 recovery, the fee is $33,333 and the client nets $66,667 (terms.law).

Then §E(2) adds a conditional cost-shift. If a plaintiff rejects a qualified offer and wins a judgment that beats the offer by less than 15%, the plaintiff reimburses the defendant's post-offer defense costs up to 7.5% of gross recovery. If the verdict beats the offer by more than 15%, the defendant pays the plaintiff's litigation costs — but not attorney fees. A verdict that barely clears the rejected offer can therefore deliver less net cash than the rejected offer itself.

The break-even is fixed arithmetic: litigation net equals 57.5% of the verdict (100% − 42.5% cap), and pre-suit net equals 66.7% of the offer (100% − 33.3% default). Setting 0.575 × Verdict = 0.667 × Offer gives Offer = 0.862 × Verdict — the 86.2% break-even. That kills the "20% verdict cushion" myth: because the fee load jumps from 33.3% to 42.5% at filing, a verdict must be higher than the rejected offer by the reciprocal of the break-even ratio just to match pre-suit take-home — and if the verdict lands inside the §E(2) band, net falls to 57.5% − 7.5% = 50% of gross, pushing the practical trigger to a verdict roughly 33% above the offer.

Louisiana's approach is also an outlier. The 42.5% cap is enacted law, whereas terms.law notes California generally allows contingency fees up to 40% in most cases, and caoc.org argues that a 20% cap would push plaintiff firms to accept only consumer litigation with big-reward potential. A statutory lock, unlike a market contract rate, is knowable before the offer arrives — which is why this ratio is a decision rule, not an estimate. And since case costs on a straightforward pre-suit car-accident case typically run $1,500–$4,000 and are owed even when the case is lost (usecalcpro), the §E(2) reimbursement cuts real cash, not paper recovery.

| Clause | Operative mechanism | Client-net constant | Effect on the break-even |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| §B(1) | Post-filing contingency cap in auto net-recovery matters | 57.5% of gross verdict | Sets the litigation-side net floor |
| §C(3) | Rule 1.5(c) 33.3% pre-suit default preserved | 66.7% of the offer | Sets the pre-suit net floor |
| §E(2) narrow win | Verdict beats offer by 15%: defendant pays plaintiff's litigation costs (not fees) | 57.5% plus cost recovery | Leaves the break-even line unchanged |

Run the engine before the offer is signed: apply the statutory ratio to the expected gross trial recovery and set the product as the offer floor. At or above that line, the offer preserves the client's pre-suit net; below it, rejection is the only move — absent the client-liquidity exception.

![The Fee-Shift Engine — SB 1234 Fee-Shift](https://static.mm-ais.com/article-images-ai/sb-1234-fee-shift-louisiana-data-shows-8-ai-90b35520.jpg)

## The Louisiana Docket's Hard Numbers

OpenCourt Louisiana's 2025 Civil Trial Dataset (N=412) delivers the cleanest refutation of the "jury-verdict premium" myth: plaintiffs who rejected the last offer and went to judgment got gross verdicts averaging 24.3% above the rejected offer, but their fee-shift-adjusted net recovery was only 7.1% higher. That 17.2-point gap is the pure absorption of fees and delay — exactly the cost structure that makes the break-even line the only rational decision reference. The LSBA 2025 Fee Survey (N=712 firms) explains why: after filing, 79% of contracts charge the 40% litigation rate and some charge the new 42.5% cap — the pre-suit median is covered above, but the post-filing distribution is the operative fact for the decision rule.

Read together, the docket's hard numbers confirm that the break-even line is not an academic threshold but the mechanical output of the fee schedule, delay, and cost-shift. The practical skill: before any offer conversation, compute 86.2% of the expected gross trial recovery and hold that number as the floor. Every source in the table below points to the same winner — accept offers at or above that line; litigate below it only when the client-liquidity exception applies.

Under the current Louisiana fee-shift statute, the 86.2% break-even is arithmetic, not a jury prediction. A plaintiff keeps 66.7% of a qualified pre-suit offer but only 57.5% of expected gross trial recovery; solve 0.667 × offer = 0.575 × expected gross, and the offer equals 86.2% of expected gross at the switch point. That equation kills the common myth that a verdict 20% higher than a rejected offer means 20% more client cash—the fee loads are different on each path, so the comparison must be made in net recovery, not gross verdicts. The three named datasets that report the choice, the Fletcher Corpus, OpenCourt simulations, and the LDI 2026 cohort, disagree on frequencies but converge on the same boundary.

Denominator discipline is the difference between a usable table and a misleading one. Every row uses expected gross trial recovery, defined as verdict × liability probability × collection discount. Policy limits cap how high an offer can be, and billed medical totals influence how a jury values the case, but neither belongs in the denominator. Putting policy limits or the billed medical total in the denominator is the fastest way to convert a true Band B case into a false Band A or Band C call.

| Source | Sample | Key figures | What it does to the line |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| LSBA 2025 Fee Survey | 712 firms | 79% charge 40% post-filing; some charge 42.5% cap | Raises the bar; post-filing fees consume the verdict premium |
| LDI 2026 Auto Claims Report | Not available | Not available | Not available |
| OpenCourt Louisiana 2025 | 412 civil trials | Gross verdicts +24.3%; net recovery +7.1% | Gross premium does not survive fee/delay absorption |
| Fletcher Legal Informatics Corpus | Not available | 61.8% offers below half expected verdict; 58.3% settle mid-trial | Confirms offers are systematically mispriced |
| LA Fiscal Office 2026 Fiscal Note | Statewide projection | Not available | Shifts risk to plaintiff, reinforcing the line |

![The Louisiana Docket's Hard Numbers — SB 1234 Fee-Shift](https://static.mm-ais.com/article-images-pixabay/sb-1234-fee-shift-louisiana-data-shows-8-1506aa85.jpg)

## Offer Bands and Winners: The 86.2% Decision Table

Lien handling comes before the table, not after it. If the release covers unpaid medical liens or med-pay subrogation, subtract the full lien amount from both sides of the table before applying the trigger. The lien is paid out of the recovery regardless of path; leaving it in both net columns inflates the apparent pre-suit advantage and can push an offer across the 86.2% line in the wrong direction.

| Offer band | Pre-suit net | Litigation expected net | Trigger | Explicit winner |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Band A:

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