§ 154.054.Compensation of Impartial Third Parties

Two subsections on who pays the neutral.

The court may set a reasonable fee for the services of an impartial third party it appointed.

Judicial control of the fee follows from judicial appointment. A court that can order parties into a procedure sets what that procedure costs them.

The parties may agree on a method of payment, and their agreement governs.

Absent agreement, the fee is taxed as other costs of suit. That places it with the costs a prevailing party may recover under the ordinary rules.

Taxing as costs is a meaningful default. The expense follows the outcome rather than resting where it was first paid.

Section 154.055 is the related provision, since a volunteer neutral who takes no compensation beyond expenses receives qualified immunity that a paid neutral does not.

The court sets the fee, and the parties can set the method. Those are two different questions, and the section answers them in that order.

Fee disputes are therefore a matter for the court. A neutral appointed by the court is paid what the court finds reasonable, not what the neutral would charge in private practice.

Taxing as costs also keeps the expense inside the case. It is handled with the other costs of suit rather than as a separate claim between the parties and the neutral.