Subsidised legal aid

For a number of fields of law, including personal injury claims, Krans & van Hilten law firm will handle cases on an assignment basis. However, family law cases are typically not handled this way.

Depending on your income and your assets, there is, in some cases, a possibility that you may qualify for government-funded legal aid. The Legal Aid Board grants a so-called “assignment of a public defender”. On the basis of this assignment you do not owe your lawyer an hourly rate, but a one-time contribution which will be established by the Board.

However, along with this contribution you may also owe, depending on the amount of your own contribution, 25 or 50% of the total court registry fee. Advances (expenses) for excerpts, translation costs etc. are not (fully) reimbursed by the Legal Aid Board and will therefore also be charged to you.

Whether you qualify for subsidised legal aid will be decided by the Legal Aid Board on the basis of your income and assets in the so-called reference year. The reference year is the second calendar year prior to the year in which you apply for “assignment of a public defender”. For instance, if you submit an application in 2009, the Legal Aid Board will make a decision about this application based on your income and assets in 2007. In order to establish the amount of your income and assets during the reference year, the Legal Aid Board will request the relevant financial information from the tax department using your social security number.

If your income or assets have considerably declined in value since then, you may request that the Board change the reference year. If this request is honoured, the Legal Aid Board will estimate the taxable income and assets in the year the application is made.

In order to be able to globally judge whether you should qualify for subsidised legal aid, it is advisable to bring a copy of your annual salary statement from two years ago.