Rule 90.12.Costs and Allowances.

Answering a garnishment and holding a debtor’s money takes time and trouble, and Rule 90.12 lets the garnishee recover something for it. When the garnishee’s interrogatory answers are not excepted to or denied and show that it holds property subject to garnishment, the garnishee may deduct a one-time sum of up to $20 — or, if the garnishee is a financial institution, whatever fee it had already agreed on with the debtor — for the trouble and expense of answering and withholding the funds. That fee comes off the top before anything else: it is not credited against the underlying judgment, and it is collected first. The garnishee can also move for additional costs, including reasonably incurred attorney fees, and the court decides what additional award, if any, is reasonable. That motion has to be filed by the time the garnishee makes payment or delivers the property into court.

The rule flips the cost burden onto the garnishor when the garnishor’s aggressive stance does not pay off. If the garnishor files exceptions to the garnishee’s interrogatory answers but never obtains a judgment against the garnishee, all the costs of that garnishment get taxed against the garnishor, and the court enters judgment in the garnishee’s favor for enough to reimburse the garnishee’s time and expenses, including reasonably incurred attorney fees. Notably, a garnishee does not lose that right to costs and fees just because it asserted, in good faith, an exemption belonging to the debtor instead of the garnishee itself.

Finally, Rule 90.12 sends appellate cost claims to a different rule entirely. A garnishee seeking an allowance for costs incurred in an appellate court has to pursue that claim under the rule governing costs in appeals, not under Rule 90.12 itself.