Performing Market Research on Expert Contracts With High Hourly Rates
Joseph Feibel – January 17, 2018
Please provide some more information on the market research you performed. Hourly rates over $500 are rare in our Agency, and there are additional approvals we have to get within the agency to use an expert with an hourly rate exceeding $500.
Here is an example of the type of information that would be helpful:
Market research was conducted to determine a suitable individual to serve as an expert witness in connection with the TPS Consumers matter, File No. 1234567. Specifically, we interviewed four individuals who appeared to have relevant experience:
1. Professor “X”
2. Professor “Y”
3. Professor “Z”
4. Professor “AA”
The first candidate we considered is Professor “X”. He holds a B.A. from Sun College and a J.D. from Moon University School of Law. Professor “X” is the Trustee Professor of Law at University of Mars of Law. His research and scholarship focuses on electronic commerce, particularly TPS Reports, and the TPS Commercial Code. He has served on a Committee of the Law Institute for recent changes to the TPS Commercial Code Articles 1 and 2, which set out a uniform set of state law rules governing TPS Reports. Since 1988, Professor “X” has served on the Permanent Editorial Board of the TPS Code, which works closely with representatives of TPS Agency to help ensure coordination between federal law and the uniform state law governing and electronic TPS payment systems. He has published numerous law journal articles including TPS Reports and systems. Professor “X” has previously served as an expert witness for the Department of Justice for All and private litigants on issues of banking payment transactions and systems. He came highly recommended by DJA staff, who described his performance as an expert witness for the government as very effective.
We also considered Professor “Y”, a professor of law at Neptune Law School. His scholarship focuses on bankruptcy, commercial law, and financial regulation. We decided not to select “Y” because his experience in the field of TPS Reports and, specifically, TPS Reports is less extensive than Professor “X”’. Additionally, Professor “Y’s hourly rate, $450, is substantially higher than Professor “X”’s rate of $350/hour.
In addition, we considered Professor “Z”, professor of law at Mercury Law School His scholarship focuses on consumer TPS transactions. Although Professor “Z” would have been well qualified to serve as an expert on the issues in this matter, he could not commit to serving as an expert during our proposed timeframe because doing so would interfere with his present detail at the TPS Protection Bureau.
Moreover, we considered Professor “AA”, who currently works as an independent TPS systems consultant. He previously served as executive vice president of TPS Agency of Saturn, where he was responsible for managing the TPS processing businesses. Although Professor “AA” has substantial knowledge of and experience with TPS, he has had minimal exposure to litigation and has never served as an expert witness. Based on our conversations with Professor “AA”, we believed that his service would require considerably more time and resources, both from him and our Agencies’ staff, than Professor “X”, who has had direct litigation experience.
Given Professor “X”’s extensive experience in studying and analyzing electronic transactions in the consumer payments industry, as well as his prior experience as an expert witness, including for the government, it is determined to award the contract for expert services to Professor “X”.
Note: this Market Research can also be used included in your JOFOC and Transmittal Memorandum