How Does the Arizona IOLTA Work?The Arizona Interest on Lawyers Trust Accounts, or Arizona IOLTA for short, is an innovative program that provides a number of great benefits to the public, especially to families and individuals who are living in poverty. This unique program allows impoverished families and individuals to have a greater access to the justice system. the interest rate that accrues from the lawyer trust accounts is then pooled in order to provide these poor people with free civil legal assistance. This money is also used to fund programs that are designed to improve the justice system.
In the United States, IOLTA programs have been established and have been ran since the year 1981. In the state of Arizona, these programs began to operate in the year 1984. An amount of over $2.5 million is being provided by the Arizona IOLTA program each year. The funds from these programs benefit more than 30,000 families through legal services at no cost, and more than 300,000 children through free education about the responsibilities and the rights that they have as citizens of the state. The success of this program depends on the mutual relationship amongst the attorneys, the grantors, and the financial institutions that are members of the program. When a lawyer receives an amount of money that does not belong to him or her, but to a client instead, the lawyer should safeguard the money by putting it into a trust account. This trust account should be separate from the own account of the lawyer. These client funds are placed into a lawyers trust account when the money cannot be used to earn the client with enough income. The client will then receive the accrued interest if the money is not big enough. The interest that came from funds that have been held for a significant amount of time will also be given to the client. |
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