Frequently Asked Questions
The best place to start is to meet with a qualified family lawyer to obtain an opinion concerning your situation. To speak with one of our Toronto family law lawyers now, please call 416-218-8888, or e-mail info@frodislaw.ca.
We believe that we can provide the same or better level of service concerning family law issues at a more reasonable rate, as our overhead is lower than in larger firms. Our services are also generally more personalized.
We do not charge for the time spent on your case by our legal assistants. In certain rare circumstances, the time spent working on your case by a law clerk might be charged.
Normally, you must be separated from your spouse for a year before you can get a divorce. In many circumstances, it is possible to resolve the other issues such as custody of and access to the children, child and spousal support, and property issues well before the year of separation is passed. In other cases, it might take longer to settle or resolve those issues.
All of the information you provide to your lawyer will remain confidential.
Before changing lawyers, you need to decide that you would prefer to work with another lawyer. Once you make that decision, the process of changing lawyers is quite easy. Your new lawyer will likely have you sign a document called a "Direction" that will instruct your previous lawyer to transfer your documents to your new lawyer. If your matter is already in court, your new lawyer might have to prepare and deliver a document called a "Notice of change in representation" indicating that you have changed lawyers.
All of the lawyers in our firm have court experience, some more than others. Several of our lawyers have very extensive court experience.
We do not believe that there is any advantage to retaining a male lawyer or a female lawyer. The most important factors in retaining a lawyer are the competence of the lawyer and your comfort level in working with your lawyer.
A separation occurs when one or both of the spouses decide that their marriage or cohabitation is at an end. Once that happens, our firm can help you resolve the issues that will arise from the separation. The spouses can still be in the same house but be considered separated.
The documents we need depend on your particular circumstances but generally include the following: A copy of your marriage certificate, at least your three most recent income tax returns, and information about your finances and property holdings on the date of marriage and at separation (usually bank statements and credit card statements).
We generally do not accept legal aid certificates. However, exceptions can be made in appropriate circumstances. Payment arrangements should be discussed with the lawyer handling your case.
The cost of your case will be highly dependent on how you and your spouse conduct yourselves, and what each of you wishes to achieve. It is possible for complicated cases to be resolved quickly and inexpensively when the parties are very cooperative. On the other hand, even relatively straightforward cases can become very costly if one or both of the parties conduct themselves in a difficult and oppositional manner.
Having the option to resolve matters outside of the court system using a method of alternative dispute resolution, is important in family law. Our firm is pleased to be able to offer our clients the choice to resolve their matters through the collaborative process either with, or without, a team of neutral third party specialists. We also regularly engage and participate in both mediation and mediation/arbitration.