I am a business owner and I have been served with a subpoena for information dating back 10 years. It is going to take me hours, if not, days to gather the information and make photocopies. Obviously I would rather not have to do this research, but can I charge a fee other than the $18 they are giving me for photocopies? Help!! Thanks! :)|||Short answer: no. If this is a legal subpoena, you have to produce the information.
If it's a genuine hardship, you can apply to the court for the party who subpoenaed you to pay a reasonable cost, but that's unusual, and the lawyer who files the motion for you will probably charge you more than you'd receive.|||You can file a motion to limit the scope of the information requested or otherwise modify the order, and request consideration of accounting for your time and expenses, to be held until such time as one party or the other can be taxed for your expenses.
You should also start (a bit late) implementing a document-retention policy that automatically disposes of documents you no longer need, making such a subpoena less expensive in the future. They can't force you to deliver information you no longer have, and there is no "bad faith" if you can show such information was "routinely" disposed of, having served its purpose. There are state and federal guidelines for many types of financial and personnel records (including email), and you should be able to find a workable template to adapt to your type of business.
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