A meet and confer is a required good-faith conversation between opposing parties, aimed at resolving a dispute informally before anyone files a motion or asks a judge to intervene. Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 37 requires the moving party to certify it tried to work the issue out before filing, and most federal district courts add their own local requirements on top of that baseline. Done properly, the process keeps routine disagreements out of court entirely. Done poorly, it gets your motion denied before the judge ever reaches the merits.
When the Rules Require One
Discovery Disputes
The most common trigger is a discovery disagreement. Before you can file a motion to compel production of documents or answers to interrogatories, Rule 37(a)(1) requires the motion to include a certification that you “in good faith conferred or attempted to confer” with the opposing party to resolve the issue without court involvement. The same certification requirement applies when you’re moving for sanctions because the other side failed to respond to discovery.1Legal Information Institute. Federal Rules of Civil Procedure Rule 37 – Failure to Make Disclosures or to Cooperate in Discovery; Sanctions Skip the certification and the judge is likely to refuse to hear the motion at all.
Local rules frequently layer additional requirements on top of Rule 37. Some districts require in-person meetings when attorneys share a county. Others demand a telephone conference between lead counsel specifically. The specifics vary, which is why reading the local rules of the court handling your case matters more than memorizing the federal standard alone.
Early Case Planning
A separate meet and confer happens near the start of every federal civil case. Rule 26(f) requires the parties to confer at least 21 days before the court’s scheduling conference or scheduling order deadline. This isn’t about a specific fight. It’s a planning session covering the nature of the claims, arrangements for initial disclosures, preservation of electronically stored information, and a proposed discovery plan. Within 14 days after that conference, the attorneys submit a written report to the court outlining the plan.2Legal Information Institute. Federal Rules of Civil Procedure Rule 26 – Duty to Disclose; General Provisions Governing Discovery
All attorneys of record and any unrepresented parties who have appeared share responsibility for arranging this conference and attempting in good faith to agree on the plan. Courts can also order the parties to attend in person rather than by phone.
What “Good Faith” Actually Requires
The phrase “good faith” appears throughout the rules, and courts have made clear it demands more than going through the motions. Firing off an email that says “please comply with our discovery requests” and then immediately filing a motion does not satisfy the requirement. Courts have consistently held that the obligation calls for personal consultation, meaning a live conversation by phone or in person where the parties actually try to resolve their differences.
The practical standard: both sides must identify what the requesting party needs, what the responding party can reasonably produce, and which specific objections genuinely cannot be resolved without a judge. A one-sided demand letter doesn’t get there. Neither does a voicemail. Many local rules go further and explicitly state that written correspondence alone, including emails and faxes, does not count as conferring in good faith. Some districts require the conference to involve each party’s lead attorney rather than a junior associate or paralegal.
Where practitioners most often get tripped up is treating the meet and confer as a box to check rather than an actual negotiation. If your certification says only “we called opposing counsel and they disagreed,” expect pushback. If it describes a substantive conversation where you narrowed five disputes down to two, you’re in much better shape.
Preparing for the Session
Walk in with a clear list of every disputed item and a realistic sense of where you can bend. For discovery disputes, organize each contested request alongside the response or objection you received and the specific reason you believe more disclosure is warranted. Vague complaints like “they didn’t give us enough” won’t move the needle. You need to articulate why a particular objection, whether privilege, relevance, or overbreadth, doesn’t hold up.
A written meet and confer letter sent before the session helps frame the discussion. It gives opposing counsel time to evaluate your positions and prepare substantive responses, which makes the actual conversation far more productive. If your court’s local rules require a joint statement of discovery disputes, start drafting your portion before the meeting. These forms, typically available on the court’s website under local rules or civil forms, contrast the original request, the response provided, and each side’s justification.
Define your minimum acceptable outcomes before the conversation starts. Know which requests are essential and which you can narrow or withdraw as a concession. That prevents the meeting from becoming a circular argument where both sides restate positions without moving.
How the Meeting Runs
Most sessions happen by phone or video conference. Schedule through a written invitation that sets a specific date and time. Make sure the people with authority to actually resolve the dispute are on the call. Sending a junior associate who has to “check with the partner” on every point wastes everyone’s time and potentially jeopardizes your good faith certification.
The initiating party typically walks through the list of contested items one by one. Opposing counsel responds to each point, either agreeing to supplement production, offering a compromise, or standing by the objection. There’s no court reporter and no formal transcript, but a detailed internal log of what was discussed and how each issue was resolved, narrowed, or left unresolved is critical. That log becomes the foundation for your certification and, if necessary, your motion papers.
When the parties reach agreement on specific items, confirm those resolutions in a follow-up email or letter immediately after the call. That prevents the common problem of both sides remembering the conversation differently two weeks later. Only the issues that remain genuinely unresolved should end up before a judge.
Filing the Certification
After the session, the moving party files a certification or declaration confirming that the meet and confer took place. The document identifies who participated, when the discussion occurred, and which issues remain unresolved despite a genuine effort to resolve them. It’s submitted as part of the motion or as a standalone filing, depending on local rules.
Thin, conclusory certifications are a common reason motions get bounced. “The parties conferred and could not reach agreement” tells the judge nothing. A stronger filing describes the specific topics discussed, the positions each side took, and why the impasse couldn’t be broken. Some courts require that level of specificity by local rule. Even where they don’t, providing it demonstrates that you actually engaged in the process.
If the court finds your certification inadequate, the likely result is an order to go back and try again. In more egregious cases, the motion may be stricken entirely, forcing a refile after a proper meet and confer.
What It Costs to Skip the Step
The most immediate consequence is losing your motion. Judges routinely deny motions to compel when the moving party fails to include the required good faith certification. And if the court finds you didn’t attempt to resolve the dispute informally before filing, it “must not” award you expenses for the motion, even if the motion would otherwise have been granted on the merits.1Legal Information Institute. Federal Rules of Civil Procedure Rule 37 – Failure to Make Disclosures or to Cooperate in Discovery; Sanctions
The expense-shifting provisions of Rule 37(a)(5) create real financial consequences on both sides:
- If the motion is granted, the court must order the party or attorney whose conduct forced the motion to pay the movant’s reasonable expenses, including attorney’s fees, unless the opposition was substantially justified or an award would be unjust.1Legal Information Institute. Federal Rules of Civil Procedure Rule 37 – Failure to Make Disclosures or to Cooperate in Discovery; Sanctions
- If the motion is denied, the court must order the movant or their attorney to pay the opposing party’s reasonable expenses for fighting the motion, unless the motion was substantially justified.1Legal Information Institute. Federal Rules of Civil Procedure Rule 37 – Failure to Make Disclosures or to Cooperate in Discovery; Sanctions
- If the motion is granted in part, the court may split the reasonable expenses between the parties as it sees fit.1Legal Information Institute. Federal Rules of Civil Procedure Rule 37 – Failure to Make Disclosures or to Cooperate in Discovery; Sanctions
Those reasonable expenses are not capped. A discovery dispute that could have been resolved by a 30-minute phone call can easily generate thousands of dollars in avoidable fees.
For parties who ignore court orders compelling discovery after the meet and confer process has run its course, the sanctions escalate. Rule 37(b)(2) authorizes courts to strike pleadings, prohibit a party from presenting certain evidence, enter a default judgment, or dismiss the case entirely.1Legal Information Institute. Federal Rules of Civil Procedure Rule 37 – Failure to Make Disclosures or to Cooperate in Discovery; Sanctions Those extreme measures are reserved for willful or repeated noncompliance, but they show how seriously courts treat the discovery process once it escalates past the informal stage.
What You Can Safely Say During the Conference
Federal Rule of Evidence 408 generally prevents either side from using statements made during compromise negotiations to prove or disprove the validity of a disputed claim or to impeach a witness.3Legal Information Institute. Federal Rules of Evidence Rule 408 – Compromise Offers and Negotiations That protection extends to conduct and statements made during the negotiation itself, which gives both sides breathing room to discuss concessions without worrying their words will come back at trial.
The protection has limits. A court can admit evidence from these discussions for purposes other than proving liability, such as showing a witness’s bias or demonstrating that a party caused undue delay.3Legal Information Institute. Federal Rules of Evidence Rule 408 – Compromise Offers and Negotiations And Rule 408 does not shield independently discoverable information just because someone mentioned it during a meet and confer. If a document exists and is relevant, you cannot protect it from production by referencing it in settlement talks.
A Note for Self-Represented Parties
Whether the meet and confer requirement applies to pro se litigants depends on the local rules of the court where the case is pending. Some districts explicitly impose the duty on self-represented parties. Others go the opposite direction and exempt attorneys from the obligation to confer when the opposing party is unrepresented.4Federal Judicial Center. Pro Se Case Management for Nonprisoner Civil Litigation If you’re representing yourself, check the local rules for your specific district court before assuming you’re either covered or exempt.