I was at a swearing in for a judicial officer recently where there were Supreme Court justices and there was some informal talk I overheard about abolishing the rule allowing referral fees in Pennsylvania. Is there any proposed rule?
To this writer’s knowledge, there is no proposed rule to abolish Rule of Professional Conduct 1.5(e), which is the rule allowing referral fees to lawyers without quantum meruit as long as the client consents. Presumably, the conversation or rumor heard was misunderstood because it would be difficult to imagine that the Pennsylvania Supreme Court would backtrack and re-establish a rule that prohibited or severely limited referral fees.
