Know exactly who you're
working with - and exactly what you’re paying for.
FTE Legal uses a transparent, income-based fee structure, so your business pays a published rate matched to where it actually is, not whatever the market will bear.
Your rate is set by who you are (your stage and resources) and, for certain matters, by what the work requires (a specialty rate that travels with the matter). The criteria are objective and published below. Final tier determination rests with FTE Legal, in its reasonable discretion, applying these criteria to your documentation.
Why can rates stay this low? FTE Legal is AI-native: one senior lawyer with a fine-tuned AI toolkit does the work a traditional firm staffs across associates and paralegals, and you are never billed for that staffing. See the case study.
Rates effective July 15, 2026
Tier 1: Small-Business Rate
FTE Legal's Social Purpose mission rate, deliberately under-market.
For small businesses operating from their own cash flow: family and service businesses, bootstrapped and pre-seed founders, food and beverage, retail, professional services, and similar operators who have not raised institutional capital.
You generally qualify for Tier 1 if all of the following are true:
- No institutional or venture equity. No priced equity round and no venture-capital, private-equity, or strategic investor on your cap table. (A conventional or SBA small-business loan does not affect Tier 1 eligibility. That is not venture funding.)
- Annual gross revenue under $2 million.
- You operate from cash flow, friends-and-family capital, or small-business lending, not from an institutional financing round.
- Routine, repeatable matters with similarly sized counterparties: formation, governance, NDAs, standard vendor and customer contracts.
What we may ask to confirm eligibility: a recent business tax return, financial statements, and/or your cap table.
Tier 2: Funded / Sophisticated-Matter Rate
At-market for the senior San Francisco Bay Area solo and boutique segment, and still well below comparable firm rates.
For funded startups, well-capitalized companies, and any client whose matter involves sophisticated counterparties or material dollar value.
Tier 2 applies if any one of the following is true:
- You have raised institutional capital: a priced equity round (seed, Series A or later), a convertible note or SAFE above $1 million, or you have venture, private-equity, or strategic investors.
- Annual gross revenue above $2 million.
- The matter requires it, regardless of your size. For example, a negotiated M&A or financing transaction, a counterparty represented by a large or sophisticated firm, or a matter material in dollar terms (generally $250,000 or more). When the work demands senior, deal-grade attention, Tier 2 applies even to an otherwise small-business client.
What we may ask to confirm eligibility: financing or cap-table documentation, financial statements, or transaction documents.
Specialty Rate: Regulated and Complex Matters
Where this rate applies, it replaces your tier rate for that work; it is not added to it. It applies where a matter substantively involves a heavily regulated space and those regulations govern the work product: certain fintech or payments contracts (BaaS partner agreements, payment-network counterparties, PCI scope), specialized U.S. privacy work such as a sophisticated DPA, or other heavily regulated subject matter. It also applies where the matter itself is genuinely complex. FTE Legal applies this in its reasonable discretion, weighing factors such as the sophistication of the structure, the number of parties and moving pieces, the intensity of negotiation, the experience of opposing counsel, and the amount at stake. Not every M&A transaction, high-value matter, or sophisticated counterparty draws this rate; many are handled at the applicable tier rate under Tier 2. Generalist corporate and commercial work on the same engagement stays at your baseline tier rate.
How tiers are determined
FTE Legal determines the applicable tier in its reasonable discretion, by applying the published criteria above to the documentation you provide. We may verify eligibility at the start of an engagement and on an ongoing basis using reasonable means, including tax returns, financial statements, cap-table information, and publicly available funding information.
If, at any point, the information shows that a client no longer meets the criteria for a given tier (for example, the client completes an equity financing round), FTE Legal may reclassify the engagement to the applicable tier going forward, on written notice. We will never change the rate for work already performed without your agreement.
We also work with local legal-aid clinics so that, where we can, no small business has to forgo legal advice in its earliest stages.