Changes to the Fee Waiver Form

Effective immediately, VLN volunteer attorneys seeking fee waiver from Minnesota courts for VLN clients will need to complete the entire Affidavit for Proceeding In Forma Pauperis (IFP) form. This change means that VLN volunteer attorneys will now need clients to provide the court with much more information regarding a client’s assets and household income than was previously required in order to obtain an Order for Proceeding In Forma Pauperis. Specifically:

• On full representation cases: It will no longer be sufficient to check box 4a.¹

• VLN Clinics: It will no longer be sufficient to check boxes 3.a., 3.b., or 3.c. (client receives mean-tested government assistance) or boxes 5 and 6 (client’s household income is below 125% of the federal poverty guidelines).

These new procedures apply to all Fourth Judicial District Court cases, including family, conciliation, and housing. These new procedures do not apply to federal courts.

The IFP statute, Minn. Stat. § 563.01, was changed to specifically allow for the court to require partial fees to be paid for those applicants who may have some ability to pay a portion of the fees.  Listing all income and asset information gives judicial officers more information to make that assessment.

While this form will take more time to complete, we urge you to take the time to review each section with the client as even a partial fee payment could be prohibitive to many of our clients. For those attorneys accepting full representation cases, some of the information is included on the client sheet. Pro se parties will need to gather this information on their own. Read More>>