Expert Witness Fees in Florida: Reports, Recovery, and Limits

Expert witness fees in Florida can be taxed as costs against the losing party in a civil case, but only if the retaining side satisfied a written-report requirement before the deadline and the fee itself is reasonable. Section 92.231 of the Florida Statutes lets the parties agree on the testifying expert’s fee, which then gets folded into the judgment as taxable costs.¹ Section 57.071 imposes the report prerequisite that many fee claims quietly fail on.²

How the Fee Amount Gets Set

Section 92.231 does not fix a rate or a cap. The parties negotiate the fee with the expert, and the agreed amount, along with the cost of any exhibits the expert uses, is taxed as costs.¹ Criminal cases involving the state or an indigent defendant follow legislative compensation standards instead of a private agreement.

Depositions are different. Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 1.390 fills the gap that Section 92.231 leaves open: when the parties and the expert cannot agree on a deposition fee, the court sets a reasonable amount and a reasonable time frame for payment. Whatever the court finds reasonable can be taxed as costs the same way a trial fee can.

What counts as “reasonable” turns on the expert’s qualifications and specialty, the complexity of the subject matter, the time invested, and prevailing rates for similar experts in the relevant field. A board-certified forensic accountant testifying on a multimillion-dollar fraud case will command a much higher rate than a general contractor opining on a roof leak. Some circuits have formalized this with standing orders requiring the parties to agree on an hourly rate at the start, leaving disputes over higher charges to a post-trial cost motion.³

The Written Report That Has to Come First

Section 57.071 is the trap. Expert witness fees cannot be taxed as costs unless the retaining party served every opposing party with a signed written report summarizing the expert’s opinions, the factual basis, any documentary evidence relied on, and the supporting authorities.²

The timing is strict. The report has to be filed at least five days before the expert’s deposition or at least 20 days before the discovery cutoff, whichever comes first, unless the court orders otherwise. Family law cases under the Florida Family Law Rules of Procedure are exempt.² Miss the deadline and you can still call the expert at trial, but shifting the fee onto the losing side becomes very hard.

Testifying Experts Versus Consulting Experts

Florida draws a hard line between experts who take the stand and those who only advise counsel. The line controls what you can recover.

Testifying Experts

Testifying expert fees are the main recoverable category. Section 92.231 applies to experts who “have testified in any cause,” and the fee plus exhibit costs is taxed once the parties agree on the amount.¹ The prevailing party in a civil action recovers these costs under Section 57.041, which provides that the party recovering judgment “shall recover all his or her legal costs and charges.”⁴ Recoverable items typically include time spent testifying, deposition fees, and exhibit costs.

Consulting Experts

Fees paid to consulting experts who never testify are generally not recoverable as taxable costs. Section 92.231 reaches only witnesses who have testified, and Section 57.071’s report requirement contemplates a testifying expert. Consulting fees may still be recoverable as part of attorney’s fees when a statute or contract authorizes fee-shifting, treated as part of the attorney’s reasonable expenses rather than a standalone cost.

Offer of Judgment as a Fee-Shifting Lever

Florida’s offer of judgment statute, Section 768.79, can change the math on expert costs dramatically. If a defendant makes a written offer that the plaintiff rejects, and the plaintiff’s judgment comes in at least 25 percent below the offer, the defendant recovers reasonable costs and attorney’s fees from the date the offer was served.⁵

The mechanism runs in reverse for plaintiffs. If a plaintiff makes a demand that the defendant rejects, and the recovery exceeds the demand by at least 25 percent, the plaintiff recovers costs and attorney’s fees from the date of the demand. The statute expressly includes “investigative expenses,” which courts have read broadly.⁵ A well-timed offer can push tens of thousands of dollars in expert charges onto the other side if the verdict lands within the statutory range.

Claiming Expert Fees After Trial

Courts do not include expert fees in the judgment automatically. The prevailing party has to ask, and support the ask.

Confirm that the signed written report required by Section 57.071 went to every opposing party within the deadlines. Without it, the claim is exposed.²
File a post-trial motion to tax costs that spells out the expert’s fee, what it covered, and why the amount is reasonable.³
Attach invoices, time records, and the fee agreement. Courts want enough detail to evaluate whether the rate and hours were reasonable for the complexity of the case.
Be ready to respond. The opposing party can challenge the fees as excessive, unnecessary, or unsupported, and the burden of justification rests on the party seeking recovery.

Why Fee Awards Get Reduced

Courts have discretion to cut or deny expert fee awards, and a handful of arguments come up again and again.

Missed Section 57.071 deadlines are the most common failure. Attorneys sometimes retain experts late or focus on deposition prep at the expense of the written report, only to discover at cost-taxation that the statutory prerequisite was never met. The statute is mandatory, and courts are generally unforgiving.

Rate disputes come next. Opposing parties routinely argue that the expert’s hourly rate exceeds the market, especially when the expert practices in a major metro area but the case is in a smaller circuit. Courts compare the charged rate against what similarly qualified experts in the relevant field and geography would charge. An expert billing $750 per hour for work most peers would perform for $400 will see a reduction regardless of credentials.

Scope challenges argue that the expert spent too many hours or duplicated work the attorney already did. Courts look at whether each billed hour added independent value. Forty hours of document review that the attorney had already summarized in a detailed memo will draw pushback on the duplicated portion.

Cost hearings are themselves adversarial, so recovering expert fees can generate its own attorney time. Experienced litigators build that into cost estimates from the outset rather than treating fee recovery as an afterthought.

Contingency Payments Are Off the Table

Paying a testifying expert a fee tied to the outcome of the case is improper under ABA Model Rule 3.4, which Florida’s ethics rules follow. An expert who stands to earn more from a favorable verdict has a financial incentive to shade testimony. The prohibition applies specifically to testifying experts; consulting experts who never take the stand generally fall outside it.⁶ Reasonable hourly or flat fees remain proper. The line is between paying for time and paying for results.

Federal Cases Filed in Florida Follow a Different Framework

Cases in federal courts sitting in Florida run on Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(b)(4)(E). The party seeking expert discovery pays the expert a reasonable fee for time spent responding, unless manifest injustice would result. That covers deposition testimony, and some courts extend it to reasonable preparation and travel time. Unlike Section 92.231’s negotiated fee, the federal rule gives courts direct authority to cap what the discovering party has to reimburse, so an expert billing $800 per hour may be reimbursed at a lower rate the court considers reasonable for the field.

Post-trial, the prevailing federal party files a Bill of Costs using Form AO 133 with itemized documentation and a verifying affidavit.⁷

Experts in Attorney Fee Hearings: The Ruffenach Shift

A March 2026 decision from Florida’s 6th District Court of Appeal is changing how experts figure into attorney fee disputes. In Ruffenach v. Deutsche Bank National Trust Company, the court held that trial judges are not always required to receive expert testimony or hold evidentiary hearings before awarding attorney’s fees under a statute, rule, or contract.⁸

The court found that the longstanding expert-testimony requirement was a judicial invention dating to 1964 with no basis in any statute or rule. Trial judges, the panel reasoned, are themselves experienced in attorney’s fees and can evaluate reasonableness from billing records, affidavits, and counsel’s representations.⁸ The decision certified conflict with earlier appellate rulings, so the Florida Supreme Court will likely take up the issue. If Ruffenach holds, attorneys will no longer need to retain and pay a fee expert simply to collect on a fee award, which would lower total costs in any case where attorney’s fees are at stake.

1
Justia. Florida Code 92.231 – Expert Witnesses; Fee
2
Online Sunshine. Florida Statutes 57.071
3
Thirteenth Judicial Circuit Court of Florida. Order on Retained Expert Witness Fees
4
Online Sunshine. Florida Statutes 57.041 – Costs; Recovery From Losing Party
5
Online Sunshine. Florida Statutes 768.79 – Offer of Judgment and Demand for Judgment
6
American Bar Association. Ethics Issues in the Use of Expert Witnesses
7
United States Courts. Bill of Costs (AO 133)
8
Florida Courts. Ruffenach v. Deutsche Bank National Trust Company