Many lawyers can describe the thing they fear with five simple letters: IOLTA.
Interest on Lawyers’ Trust Accounts (IOLTA) is mandatory for lawyers. And, as WSBA Practice Management Advisor Margeaux Green explains in the new issue of Washington State Bar News: “For many Washington lawyers, managing a client trust account (IOLTA) is one of the most anxiety-producing aspects of practice. Lawyers regularly describe the responsibility of handling client funds as ‘heavy,’ and for good reason.”
Why? Well according to the 2024 Washington Discipline System Annual Report, about 4 percent of grievances filed against attorneys were related to trust account overdrafts.
In “Managing Client Trust Accounts: Preventing the Most Common Compliance Failures,” Green writes that ““The issue is rarely indifference. Lawyers care deeply about protecting client funds and are highly concerned about complying with the RPCs. But concern alone does not create compliance. Over time, even careful lawyers can fall into practices that do not fully align with the Rules of Professional Conduct, especially when systems are informal, training is inconsistent, and oversight is insufficient.”
Also in this issue: The 2026 Washington legislative session has come to a close and there’s a lot to talk about. WSBA Legislative Affairs Manager Sanjay Walvekar breaks down what happened this session, during which the Legislature passed an $80.2 billion supplemental operating budget with approximately $1.6 billion in new spending for crime victim services, state hospital staffing, and responses to federal policy changes, among other priorities. Read Walvekar’s 2026 legislative recap to learn about the Bar priority bills and other legislation of interest to lawyers.
In this issue, you can also learn about a group of retired King County judges who have made it their mission to exonerate people who have been wrongfully imprisoned; read a Q&A with a longtime WSBA volunteer, Ann Guinn; take a look at Washington’s weapons-surrender statute; explore the ethics of RPC 3.8, the unique rule pertaining to prosecutors; and catch up on all the usual Bar News columns and essentials.
