Divorce
Ending a marriage, whether the issues are settled between the spouses or left for the court.
How to Choose the Right Family Lawyer for Your Legal Matter in Calgary
photo — meeting with a lawyer (4:3)
Choosing a family lawyer is a decision you can check rather than guess at. Work out what level of help your situation needs, confirm the lawyer's Law Society listing, ask how they charge, check that they work on matters like yours, and agree how you will communicate before you retain anyone.
Step 1: Decide What Level of Help You Need
Decide whether you need representation for the whole matter or help with a particular task. Mediation has a different role: a neutral mediator assists a negotiation. Public legal-help services have their own eligibility and scope.
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Full representation. A lawyer takes carriage of the matter and acts for you throughout.
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Limited-scope or unbundled help. A lawyer is retained for one part of the matter - a document, a step, a piece of advice - rather than the whole of it. The Centre for Public Legal Education Alberta publishes a directory of lawyers who offer coaching and limited services.
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Mediation. Where both people are willing to negotiate, a mediator helps them resolve the dispute without going to court. CPLEA's directory also lists family mediators, parenting coordinators, and collaborative family professionals.
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Free and low-cost services. Calgary Legal Guidance offers 30 to 45 minutes of free legal support from volunteer lawyers on many family law issues, with eligibility depending on income. Student Legal Assistance is a pro bono clinic for low-income residents of Calgary and the surrounding area. Legal Aid Alberta represents people who meet its residency and financial guidelines, and clients are expected to repay Legal Aid Alberta for the representation it provides.
Which level fits depends on the matter rather than on the budget alone: whether the other person is represented, how much is already agreed, whether there is a single step you need help with, and whether children, significant property or safety concerns are involved.
Step 2: Check the Law Society Listing
The Law Society of Alberta publishes a public Lawyer Directory. Use it to check the regulator's record of the lawyer you are considering.
Search the directory by the lawyer's name. That is what its basic search takes, and it is the direct route to a particular lawyer's profile.
A profile shows the lawyer's name, business address and phone number, whether they are currently practising, and the year they became a lawyer in Alberta.
The directory also publishes proceedings information, and it states which period that information covers. Read that coverage statement, and do not draw a broader conclusion from what a search does or does not show.
Step 3: Ask How the Lawyer Charges
The Centre for Public Legal Education Alberta puts this among the questions to ask before you hire anyone: ask how the lawyer will charge you for their work.
What you are asking about is the basis of charging rather than a single number. Is the work charged by time, at a fixed price, or a mixture of the two? What is included in a quoted figure and what is billed separately? When would you be told that the basis is changing?
These are questions you put to the lawyer you are considering, and the answers belong to that lawyer rather than to any general rule.
Our own page on consultations sets out how one is arranged and what can affect the legal work.
Step 4: Check the Fit to Your Matter
The same guidance suggests asking whether the lawyer has experience with your type of issue, and family law covers a wide range of them.
Parenting
Parenting time, decision-making responsibility and guardianship.
Support
Child support, and spousal or partner support.
Property
Dividing what a couple owns and owes when a relationship ends.
Agreements
Prenuptial, cohabitation and separation agreements.
Naming your own situation in those terms makes the question easier to ask and the answer easier to judge.
Ask which court your matter would be heard in, and how much of the lawyer's work is done in that court. Alberta family matters are heard in the Court of King's Bench of Alberta or the Alberta Court of Justice depending on what is being decided, and the two are not interchangeable.
which court hears your family matter›
You can also ask about the law itself. A lawyer working in Alberta family law should be comfortable explaining which statute applies to your situation, what the current terms for parenting arrangements are, and how property is dealt with for married spouses and for adult interdependent partners. Those are things you can ask about in a first conversation.
Step 5: Agree How You Will Communicate
The Centre for Public Legal Education Alberta makes a point that is easy to skip: a lawyer is acting for other clients as well as you, so replies are not always immediate.
That is a reason to agree the arrangements at the outset rather than to discover them later. How will you hear from the lawyer, and how often? Who do you contact when they are unavailable? What kinds of question can be dealt with by email, and what needs a meeting? What will you be told without asking?
Settling that at the start is part of choosing, not an administrative afterthought.
Step 6: Be Candid, and Be Prepared
The Centre for Public Legal Education Alberta recommends being candid with your lawyer, including about facts you would rather not raise.
And bring the documents related to your case to the first meeting, organised. Preparing for that meeting is a subject of its own.
Frequently Asked Questions
People usually seek advice when a decision is close: a separation has happened or is being considered, an agreement is being negotiated or signed, a court document has arrived, or an existing order no longer fits the circumstances. Each of those is a point at which advice changes what you do next.
Talk to a Calgary Family Lawyer
If you have worked through those checks and want to discuss your own situation, a consultation is the next step.
The lawyer at THEBIL Law who handles family law matters is Nne Christiana Udo.
Call 403-457-3128.