Kirkman Whitford Brady Berryman & Farias P.A

**DO NOT USE THIS LAW FIRM – PLEASE READ**

Issues: Exceedingly slow, unresponsive, unprofessional, and uncouth

Details: I contacted Kirkman, Whitford, Berryman, Gordon & Brown P.A. in July 2025 to prepare several simple and standard estate planning documents (will, living will, POA, and medical POA) for my aunt. Although I live in Charlotte, NC, I made the roughly five-hour drive to attend the initial meeting with her on 8/8/2025. The meeting lasted about an hour while the attorney gathered my aunt’s information and estate wishes. During that meeting, it was clearly communicated that I live out of town and would be paying on her behalf, which they acknowledges as a non-issue.

What followed was silence. After the initial meeting, we heard nothing for three months. I eventually called the office in early November, which took multiple attempts to get someone on the phone. When the assistant finally answered, she had no status update on the documents and no estimated timeline for completion. We then waited another 30 days before receiving draft documents on 12/1/25 (115 days subsequent to the first meeting).

Due to unrelated personal matters, my aunt did not submit her requested revisions until 2/4/26. The finalized documents were sent approximately nine days later (2/11/26).

The Problem: These four documents are routine and straightforward, particularly for a simple estate such as my aunt's, which the law firm states on their website as its “expertise.” A basic Google search suggests this process typically takes at most 2 months at most “normal” firms. From our initial meeting (8/8) to receiving draft documents (12/1) was 115 days. The real issue comes to light in the final invoice (included within this post) that self-proclaims the total hours it took to produce these documents was 3.5 hours, one of which was the initial one hour face-to-face meeting. In total, when the matter was in the firm’s hands, it took four months to produce documents that ultimately totaled just 2.5 billable hours (excluding the one-hour initial meeting). In most professional environments, that level of delay would be unacceptable.

Why I’m Writing This: The conclusion, however, is where the irony becomes difficult to ignore. I could not attend the final signing appointment (Wednesday 2/25/26). Per their agreement, payment is required at signing. My aunt was allowed to leave under the assumption I would call the firm or they would call me for final payment. About 24 hours later, I received one phone call at 3:45pm on Thursday, but given my regular employment status like most working people I was in a meeting and unable to answer. The assistant was nice enough to leave a voicemail clearly stating that I could return the call in the coming days or even the following Monday to settle the invoice. Given the firms stated business hours are 8:30am-5:00pm I figured I would call the next day and take care of things. Less than 17 hours later (10:45am Friday), however, the attorney sends my nearly 70-year-old aunt an aggressive and highly unprofessional email stating that she is legally responsible for payment and to call immediately and pay, as well as claiming her office called multiple times and left numerous voicemails, which was simply a lie and I have phone records to corroborate this.

The irony of the situation is that after taking four months to complete approximately three hours of work, the firm couldn’t wait even 24 hours for me to respond to their voicemail that clearly states I had at minimum a few days to reach out. In fact, they gave me only 3 business hours to respond before launching threatening communications directed at an elderly client. As anyone would, I immediately called and expressed my displeasure and paid the invoice. If patience and tolerance are your estate’s primary assets, this may be the right firm for you - otherwise, I would look elsewhere.

Jane Gordon is a exceptional Lawyer. She helped me switch my son's guardianship to North Carolina from Illinois with ease. Thank you Jane.

I had Brady for my divorce and it was the worst experience ever. She is completely incompetent and has no business being a lawyer.