I hired a PA Patent attorney and he gave me an estimate for the initial submittal to be $4000 - $6000 for the patent. I received bills for over $11000 just for him for two months (government fees not included).
Unfortunately there is a story with this and I need help deciding what I should be doing. I handed all the materials to him in Oct of last year. I was asking him via e-mail and left a message each month on his phone requesting to work on the patent in Nov, Dec and Jan. I finally called the main office in Feb stating, there is 1 month left for the patent pending status.
He gave me excuses that my e-mail was being directed to his junk box, somehow, and that he was busy doing other work. Obviously he was avoiding me to do this other work. I just started a new job in Feb and they don't allow cell phones in the building, so it was hard getting in touch with each other.
The patent was submitted on time. I have these huge bills that are only itemized by service dates without any time of duration of work, which is grossly over the original estimate.
I called the lawyer firm, spoke with billing and they directed me to talk to my lawyer. He sends me an e-mail back stating that he will get back to me later in the week. I requested that he e-mail me first before he calls so I can make arrangements for communicating. This isn't the first time he has made me wait to talk to him; and at that time he was working on my patent.
I’m going to request for times on the bill, along with an explanation of why it is so high.
Am I liable for the times he leaves me messages when I told him he can’t get in touch with me while I’m at work? Am I liable for the rush situation he put himself in from not listening to me when I requested things to be done?
Is there anything that I should be doing, requesting, demanding, refusing…??? I’m half ready to find a different law firm, because I feel like I can’t trust this guy. I gave him so much time and he has only caused me stress and problems. Unfortunately there are other signs that I should have listened to in order to decide that I should have found someone else.
Should I get a new patent attorney even though the arbitration process is about to begin? And is it possible to do this?

