Thanks for the link Nelson. The section you highlighted pertains to "extraordinary services".

However, for my situation it's an issue concerning the determination of fees for "ordinary services". I wonder if the probate judge will be open to my argument that the statutory fee isn't reasonable for a simple estate like this one. Will the judge determine the attorney's fee for "ordinary services" based upon the attorney's hours worked, or will the judge just simply compute the ordinary service fee based on the percentage of the probate process completed at this point in time? If you base the fee on hours worked it's probably $6k. But if you base it on the statutory fee adjusted for percentage of the probate process completed, the I expect the fee would be about $16k (2/3 completed x $24k statutory fee)

Considering the attorney has a signed engagement letter from me stating his fee will be based on the statutory fee schedule I expect the judge would decide in his favor. I don't know if the judge would even consider my argument that the statutory fee is excessive for a simple probate like this.