The core promise: no recovery, no fee
A contingency fee means the attorney's fee is contingent — dependent — on actually winning or settling the case. If there's no recovery at all, the client generally owes no attorney fee, regardless of how much work went into the case.
What the agreement is legally required to say
Idaho Rule of Professional Conduct 1.5(c) requires a contingent fee agreement to be in writing, and to state the method by which the fee will be determined, including what litigation expenses are deducted and whether that happens before or after the contingent fee itself is calculated.
No cap, on the private fee
Idaho places no statutory cap on the contingency fee percentage for any type of personal injury case. The rate is negotiated privately between attorney and client, subject only to Rule 1.5's general reasonableness requirement.
A real, separate rule for smaller claims
Here's a genuinely distinctive Idaho feature: Idaho Code § 12-120(4) entitles a prevailing plaintiff in a personal injury case worth $35,000 or less to a separate, court-awarded reasonable attorney's fee, taxed as part of the costs of the action — a genuine fee-shifting remedy layered on top of, not a replacement for, the private contingency arrangement.
Calculated independently, by design
The statute is explicit on this point: the court determining this fee award must not base its decision on any contingent fee arrangement between attorney and client, or any formula tying the fee to a percentage of the recovery. Instead, the court applies its own reasonableness factors under Idaho's civil procedure rules. This keeps the two fee mechanisms — the private contingency agreement and the statutory small-claims fee award — genuinely distinct processes.