Taipei Bar Association

Case:

Key Words:

legal consultation service, consultation fee standards, bar association

Reference:

Fair Trade Commission Decision of January 26, 2011 (the 1004th Commissioners' Meeting), Disposition Kung Ch'u Tzu No. 100016

Industry:

Professional Associations (9422)

Relevant Laws:

Article 14 of the Fair Trade Law

Summary:

1. The FTC was informed that Taipei Bar Association had printed and distributed a notice requesting that "members of this association must charge consultation fees in accordance with the established standards." The FTC initiated an ex officio investigation into the matter regarding suspected violation of the Fair Trade Law (FTL).
2. Findings of the FTC after investigation:
   During the 1970s, Taipei Bar Association printed a notice to request "members of this association MUST charge consultation fees in accordance with the established standards" to eliminate the doubt of concerned parties regarding the legality and standard of lawyer's consultation service fees. The notice was given to new members when they joined the association. According to the explanation of the Ministry of Justice, the said notice appeared to have been misworded from the intended meaning that the members "SHALL charge consultation fees in accordance with the established standards." To end the controversy and make the wording consistent with the intended meaning, the language used in the said notice could be revised.
3. Grounds for disposition:
   1. The notice from Taipei Bar Association to request that "members of this association must charge consultation fees in accordance with the established standards" was normally given to new members when they joined the association. The matter in concern – consultation service – is one of the legal service types. It covers more than just litigations and can be provided for cases under the jurisdiction of any court. People from other places may seek legal consultations in Taipei. Considering the costs of time and transportation required for the trading counterparts to acquire legal services as well as the corresponding distances and travel practices, the FTC therefore deemed the geographic market involved in this case as encompassing Taipei City, New Taipei City and Keelung City, while the product market was the legal service market.
   2. According to Article 11 of the Attorney Regulation Act, "an attorney at law is not entitled to practice until he/she has become a member of a Bar Association." Hence, it is understandable that the notice from Taipei Bar Association would have a rather significant binding effect on the members. Judging from its content, the notice was indeed intended to demand that the members charge consultation fees for their service and this had an effect on the choice of the member attorneys and people seeking consultation service to decide whether and how much a fee was to be collected. Taiwan Bar Association's requesting its member attorneys to charge for the consultation service every time was imposing a restriction on the transaction between people seeking legal consultations and the member attorneys and would probably cause attorneys originally not charging consultation fees to start charging and thus creating competition restriction in the legal service market and consequently jeopardizing the choice of the trading counterparts to decide between paying and not paying to receive legal consultations. In the end, the supply-demand function of the legal service market would be affected.
   3. The stipulations in the Attorney Regulation Act regarding standards for attorney service fees and the charter of Taipei Bar Association only suggest that attorneys may refer to established fee standards when providing legal services. There are no clauses indicating that collection of consultation fees is a requirement at all. The notice from Taipei Bar Association, however, did carry the connotation that its member attorneys had to charge for their consultation service and this was inconsistent with the association's allegation that the notice was meant to be a reference for the members only. In addition, this did not comply with the regulation of "where there is any other law governing the conducts of enterprises in respect of competition, such other law shall govern" stipulated in Article 46 of the FTL. Apparently, when related laws were legislated or when Taipei Bar Association decided to print and issue the notice, fair market competition and the impact on the market supply-demand function were not taken into consideration and, as a result, the freedom and fairness in market competition were hampered. As free legal consultation service centers have been in operation all over the country, there was really no need to insist that attorneys had to charge for the consultation services they provided. Consequently, the conduct of Taipei Bar Association to continue to issue the said notice was in violation of the regulations stipulated in the FTL against concerted action. According to Article 46 of the FTL, the association could not be exempted from the regulation of the FTL.
   4. Based on the above reasoning, by printing and issuing the notice requesting that "members of this association must charge consultation fees in accordance with the established standards," Taipei Bar Association already restricted the business activities of its members and the conduct was sufficient to affect the market function of supply and demand of service. It was in violation of Article 14 (1) of the FTL. Acting in line with the First Section of Article 41 of the FTL, the FTC ordered the association to immediately cease the unlawful act.

Appendix:
Taipei Bar Association's Uniform Invoice Number: 78379129

Summarized by:Tsai, Jing-Hui; Supervised by: Chen,Yuhn-Shan