Who decides whether to accept a settlement offer?

The offer arrives through your lawyer, with a recommendation attached and a tone suggesting the matter is already resolved. Maybe there is a deadline on it. Maybe you are being told this is as good as it gets.

The decision is still yours. Not partly yours, not yours subject to your attorney’s approval. In California, the choice to accept or reject a settlement belongs to the client, and it is one of the few decisions a lawyer cannot make for you even when the lawyer is right about the number.

핵심 요약

• California requires your lawyer to abide by your decision whether to settle, and gives your lawyer no implied authority to bind you to an agreement.
• A retainer clause giving your attorney discretion to accept offers is void in California to the extent it would let them settle over your objection.
• If a settlement was entered without your authorization, objecting promptly and in writing matters, because enforceability can turn on what the other side reasonably relied on.
• The deadline to sue your former attorney can be as short as one year from the date you discovered the problem.

Can your lawyer accept a settlement without your consent?

No. Rule 1.2 of the California Rules of Professional Conduct states that a lawyer shall abide by a client’s decision whether to settle a matter. The rule does not carve out an exception for offers the lawyer considers reasonable.

The California Supreme Court reached the same place decades earlier. An attorney has no implied authority to bind a client to a settlement or to surrender substantial rights, and hiring a lawyer does not transfer that power to them.

Your lawyer can advise you, argue with you, and tell you plainly if they think you’re making a mistake. That’s their job. Signing the settlement is not; that decision is yours alone.

What if your lawyer already settled without asking you?

The settlement is voidable by you, which means your objection is what undoes it. In 2021, a California appellate court voided a settlement that a firm had entered on the morning of trial over its client’s express objection, reversed the resulting judgment, and referred the attorneys to the State Bar.

The honest version of this answer includes a caveat. Unwinding a signed settlement is fact-dependent, and a defendant who dealt in good faith and reasonably believed your attorney had authority will argue the agreement should stand. Which is why the timing of your objection carries weight. A documented objection made within days is a different posture than one raised months later, after the release has been signed and the funds have moved.

If money has already been paid and your former firm is holding it, the rules on how long a lawyer can keep settlement funds in trust are separate from the question of whether the settlement itself is valid.

Does a clause in your retainer change the answer?

Not in the way firms sometimes suggest. The court in the 2021 case examined a retainer provision granting the attorneys the right to accept settlement offers in their sole discretion and held the clause invalid to the extent it purported to authorize settlement over the client’s objection.

Advance authorization is permitted in California, but the comment to Rule 1.2 says the client may revoke that authority at any time. So a signature you gave at intake, months before any offer existed, does not override what you say when the offer actually arrives.

Worth reading your own agreement for this language. Its presence is not a good sign about how the firm approaches the question, even though the clause cannot do what it appears to do.

How long do you have to act?

Shorter than most people assume. Under Code of Civil Procedure section 340.6, a claim against your attorney must be brought within one year after you discover, or reasonably should have discovered, the facts constituting the wrongful act, or within four years of the act itself, whichever comes first.

That one year is subject to tolling in four situations the statute lists: you have not yet sustained actual injury, the attorney continues to represent you on the same matter, the attorney willfully conceals the facts, or you are under a legal or physical disability. Continued representation is the one that catches people, because the clock often has not started while the same firm is still on the file.

If you found out three months ago that something went wrong, you are already inside a deadline nobody told you about.

Why you should put your position in writing

No California rule requires your settlement authorization to be in writing. The rules require only that you make the decision, which means an authorization given over the phone counts, and a disputed one becomes your word against your attorney’s.

Your best bet? Send your attorney an email stating what you will and will not accept, dated, before an offer is on the table. Restate it when your position changes. It costs nothing, and it converts a future argument into a document.

There is a related rule working in your favor. Business and Professions Code section 6103.5 requires your lawyer to promptly transmit any written settlement offer to you, and makes those written offers and communications discoverable. Ask for offers in writing.

Where can you actually go?

Three separate places, and they do different things. A complaint to the State Bar addresses attorney discipline, not compensation for you.

Mandatory fee arbitration under Business and Professions Code section 6200 and following handles fee and cost disputes. It is voluntary for you and binding on your attorney if you initiate it, but the window is tight: once your attorney gives written notice of the right to arbitrate, you generally have 30 days to request it.

부당 사망 클레임을 제기할 수 있는 Client Security Fund reimburses clients for losses caused by an attorney’s dishonest conduct, such as stolen settlement funds. It does not cover ordinary negligence or a settlement you simply regret; payments are discretionary, and an application must be filed within four years of discovering the loss.

None of those routes evaluates whether your underlying injury claim was worth more than it settled for. That is a different question, and if it is the one you actually have, a second look at how the case was valued is where to start.

If you think your case settled for the wrong number

A settlement you did not authorize and a settlement you authorized without understanding are different problems with different remedies, and both are worth a conversation before the deadlines above run.

If you are still represented and considering a change, timing affects your options, and when it is too late to change lawyers covers that separately.

Call DK Law for a 무료 상담 about your injury claim.