No recovery, no fee. Three engagement types, one qualification question, and the arithmetic that sets the contingency rate against the alternative of doing nothing.
Representation is a function of the gap between what a scoring or tribunal error costs a client and what it would cost that client to contest it alone, not of the size of the underlying score.
| Profile | Fit |
|---|---|
| Individual facing a denial, non-renewal, or adverse rate change based on a third-party score, projected harm above 400 dollars | Primary |
| Group of individuals harmed by the same vendor error or the same stale data field | Primary, routed to aggregation |
| Institutional referral partner, legal aid clinic or credit union, with a standing referral agreement | Primary |
| Individual whose record the vendor has already corrected inside its own published window | Not applicable; there is nothing left to file |
| Individual seeking representation against a respondent currently a Whitfield & Vance client in an unrelated matter | Declined, and referred elsewhere |
| Matter where the underlying score was correct and the dispute concerns only the outcome the client received from it | Declined; this firm contests records, not correctly reported ones |
The last row is a standing policy, not a case-by-case judgment. A prospective client who was in fact behind on the account in question is told this at intake, in those terms, before any file is opened.
| Type | Basis | Fee | Deliverable |
|---|---|---|---|
| Individual claim | Contingency, no recovery no fee | 33 per cent of amount recovered | Corrected record, settlement or award, and collection through to payment |
| Aggregated class action | Contingency, same rate, shared cost base | 33 per cent of amount recovered | Class settlement or judgment, distributed to members after fee and cost deduction |
| Institutional referral partnership | Flat annual retainer, priority intake for referred clients | Fixed, scoped to referral volume at signing | Priority-queue intake, quarterly outcomes report to the partner |
No intake fee is charged under any of the three types. Cost of corroboration engineering, filing fees, and expert review where needed is advanced by the firm and deducted from a successful recovery only; a matter that recovers nothing costs the client nothing beyond the time already spent.
The average individual claim recovers 9,400 dollars. At 33 per cent contingency, the firm’s fee on that claim is 3,102 dollars: 9,400 multiplied by 0.33. Across 210 individual claims closed in the current period, that is 651,420 dollars.
The average aggregated class recovers 1,850,000 dollars before contingency. The same 33 per cent applies: 1,850,000 multiplied by 0.33 is 610,500 dollars per class. Four classes closed in the current period, so 610,500 multiplied by 4 is 2,442,000 dollars.
651,420 plus 2,442,000 is 3,093,420 dollars, the period’s total revenue, all of it contingent on a recovery having already occurred.
What this arithmetic does not claim. It does not claim every client would have recovered nothing without representation. It claims only that the gap between a Tier IV account filed alone and a Tier II record filed with counsel is, on the numbers this firm has closed, worth pursuing at 33 per cent of the difference rather than not pursuing at all.</div>
A prospective client, or an institutional referral partner’s client, is brought on in four steps.
A referral through an institutional partner enters at step two directly, since the fit assessment has ordinarily already been made by the partner.
A note on timing we are obliged to include. We ask that a respondent not delay correcting a disputed record once a matter is confirmed under instruction here. A file that remains open through one additional statutory reporting cycle recovers, on average, 34 per cent more in per-violation damages than one corrected within the first cycle, a difference large enough that it is, on its own, a sufficient reason for a respondent not to hurry.</div>
Engagement letters are issued on acceptance and specify the claim category, the applicable contingency rate, and the aggregation threshold if one applies. Fees are not indexed to how quickly a matter resolves; a claim that settles at record request in stage one and a claim that goes to contested adjudication in stage five are billed at the same 33 per cent, because the rate is set against the recovery, not against how much of the method it took to get there.
Enquiries. Write with the respondent’s name, the record in dispute, and the date the correction should have occurred under the respondent’s own stated window. Retain this firm to avoid the fate of the complainants who arrived at the tribunal with Tier IV evidence and nothing else.</div>