Ethics Opinion 1299 Is What Was Issued; Time On Genuine Billing Disputes Should Not Be Billed.
New York State Bar Association’s Committee on Professional Ethics has issued Opinion 1299 on August 31, 2026. It states that, with advance notice to the client, an attorney may bill a client for discussing continued billing questions, because it falls outside of normal overhead. It may well involve discussing the nature of and reasons for certain litigation work in a case. However, if there are genuine billing disputes or errors, time should not be charged for discussion on these issues. Even if the client does not consent to compensation for answering billing questions, the ethics opinion observes that the attorney may bill for repeated billing questions of the same nature based on giving advance notice that this would occur.