In our court system, a divorce may take more than a year after a petition is filed to become final. Emotionally drained individuals walk away with no one a victor. Contact our firm today to speak with an attorney about the possibility of using the collaborative approach in your divorce.
Is It Better To Fight It Out, or Work Together?
Lawsuits can be costly, time-consuming and emotionally draining. Taking an important child custody, child support, property division or other divorce matter to court can result in an outcome that disappoints everyone involved. In fact, many lawyers and judges will say that if neither party is happy when the final ruling is made, it was probably the right decision.
There is an alternative to giving control over to the courts. You can work together in a collaborative law setting to resolve disputes and establish agreements that are truly custom tailored to the needs of your family. The team at the Sweeney Law Offices can help.
Our trained collaborative law attorneys serve the legal needs of families in the Pittsburgh area and throughout western Pennsylvania. Contact us today to discuss whether collaborative divorce may be a real option in your case, or continue reading to learn more about some of the general concepts and features of collaborative family law.
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While the traditional adversarial process may be necessary to protect your rights and interests in a divorce or child custody dispute, in most cases you will find that the collaborative process offers a chance to avoid unnecessary expense, delay and stress for everyone involved, especially the children who are looking to you to set an example of how important issues are handled.
Not many attorneys are trained or experienced in the use of collaborative law techniques. The team at the Sweeney Law Offices has received specific training from the Collaborative Law Association of Southwestern Pennsylvania (CLASP) and has extensive experience in the collaborative approach to resolving custody, complex property division, support and other issues in divorce. Contact us today to learn more.
Collaborative Divorce
The most significant developments in collaborative law have been in the family law arena. In fact, many people talking about "collaborative law" are actually referring to collaborative divorce. If you are interested in learning more about the advantages of collaborative divorce, contact Sweeney Law Offices in Cranberry Township, Pennsylvania to speak with an attorney experienced in collaborative law.
How It Works
In the collaborative family law model, parties and their attorneys work together to achieve win-win solutions. The parties sign an agreement that sets out how the process will work and promise to work together in good faith to resolve their divorce. Nearly all negotiations take place in a series of four-way meetings with the parties and their attorneys. These meetings also may include experts, such as child behaviorists, depending upon the specific issue to be addressed.
The parties agree to exchange all necessary information openly so that discovery costs are minimized. If the parties are simply unable to resolve their issues, they may still resort to a traditional divorce. In order to do so they must retain new lawyers, and unless both parties consent, the information brought to light during the collaborative process may not be used in the courtroom.
Partial Agreements
In some instances, parties are able to resolve some, but not all, of the disputes at issue in their divorce. In this case, the parties may:
- Opt to end the process and begin again
- Decide to sign a partial agreement and then go to court to resolve the remaining issues
- Elect to hire a mediator to help them resolve the remaining issues
- Submit the unresolved issues to an arbitrator
- Have previously chosen in their collaborative stipulation a procedure for bringing individual, discrete issues before the court for decision, while proceeding with the collaborative divorce on the rest of the case
Even in cases that are not completely settled, many participants of the collaborative process find that costs are reduced, time is shortened and the negative fall-out of the adversarial process is dramatically decreased.
Conclusion
Divorce is always difficult. However, many attorneys and clients agree that the collaborative divorce approach greatly decreases the potential for negative outcomes. Contact Sweeney Law Offices in Cranberry Township, Pennsylvania to learn more about this unique approach to divorce.
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