THE JUDGE SHOULD NOT HAVE CONSIDERED WHETHER THE INVOICES FOR ATTORNEY’S FEES WERE “REASONABLE;” THE ONLY QUESTION IN AN ACCOUNT-STATED ACTION IS WHETHER THE CLIENT OBJECTED TO THE AMOUNTS OF THE INVOICES (FIRST DEPT).

The First Department, reversing Supreme Court, determined the judge should not have considered whether the invoices for attorney’s fees were “reasonable” in this account-stated action. The only relevant question is whether defendant objected to the amounts of the invoices:

The court improperly engaged in a reasonableness analysis with regard to the invoices which were the subject of plaintiff’s account stated claim (see Matter of Lawrence, 24 NY3d 320, 343 [2014] [“an attorney or law firm may recover on a cause of action for an account stated with proof that a bill, even if unitemized, was issued to a client and held by the client without objection for an unreasonable period of time(,) (and) need not establish the reasonableness of the fee since the client’s act of holding the statement without objection will be construed as acquiescence as to its correctness”] …; see L.E.K. Consulting LLC v Menlo Capital Group, LLC, 148 AD3d 527, 528 [1st Dept 2017). Jones Law Firm, P.C. v Peck, 2024 NY Slip Op 02502, First Dept 5-7-24

​Practice Point: The “reasonableness” of an invoice is not a concern in an account-stated action. The only question is whether the recipient of the invoice objected to the amount.