Judges at opposite ends of the state have slashed fee requests by a Pennsylvania firm in starkly similar Fair Debt Collect Practices Act (FDCPA) cases. Western District Judge Michael Telesca (See Profile), in Payne v. Allied Interstate, 12-cv-6136, and Southern District Judge Colleen McMahon (See Profile), in Solomon v. Allied Interstate, 12 Civ. 7940, both said the Ambler-Pa. firm of Kimmel & Silverman attempted to bill far too much in FDCPA cases, should not have billed for the multitude of emails that went back and forth among its lawyers and had no business charging the defendant for its costs in having an attorney admitted pro hac vice.
In Payne, Telesca said Kimmel & Silverman “has a long history of overreaching in its fee applications and has been admonished by several courts for attempting to bill for tasks that are not compensable as attorney’s fees.” He chastised the firm for work that was “unnecessary, redundant, administrative, or clerical” and chopped its fee request from $5,895 to $1,880.
