How much should a law firm pay a docketing clerk?

Start with the data problem, because it decides what any docketing pay number can honestly claim to be.

BLS has no separate occupation code for docketing clerks, so there is no "docketing clerk" line to quote anywhere in the federal data.

What exists are proxy occupations, and this page names the proxy every time a figure appears.

The first proxy is file clerks (SOC 43-4071), which our mapping reads as the occupation closest to calendar-and-records work — a mapping judgment, not a BLS classification.

BLS OEWS May 2025 — the latest release — puts the national median annual wage at $43,600 ($20.96 an hour), with a 10th percentile of $31,200, a 90th percentile of $63,490 and employment of 73,440 across all industries.

The legal services industry cut (law firms, NAICS 5411) counts 8,280 file clerks at a median of $44,060.

Both lines come from the same release and the same statistic, so the industry cut reads directly against the all-industry number — and it is the line we would price a calendar-and-records hire against.

The second proxy is Legal Support Workers, All Other (SOC 23-2099) — a catch-all category, as the title says, for legal support work outside the occupations BLS names separately.

Nationally the median was $72,110 ($34.67 an hour), with a 10th percentile of $43,800, a 90th percentile of $179,960 and employment of 46,760; in legal services, 10,550 workers at a median of $63,100.

Which proxy fits your opening depends on the duties, and the two should not be blended: they are different occupations, so ranking one against the other — or averaging them — compares different series.

If the job is dates, records and calendar entry, the file clerk line is the nearer read.

If it includes legal support work that goes beyond filing, the legal support workers line is the nearer one.

Match the proxy to the job description and use that line alone.

A national median will not necessarily match your opening: pay moves by market, and for these proxies our research pulled the national series only — we have no state table for this role's proxies.

Price your market from postings instead: the pay-range statutes described below put competitors' ranges in public job ads, which makes the local market easier to read.

Our docketing clerk salary data page explains why no BLS figure carries the title, with the neighboring paralegal and legal secretary occupations shown for context only — not the two proxies above.

For the method — turning a benchmark into a defensible band with a floor and a top — see our guide to benchmarking law firm pay.

None of the sources routed for this page prices a docketing clerk by experience level, practice area or firm size.

There is no sourced senior-docketing premium, no sourced litigation-vs-transactional gap, and no sourced small-firm discount — so this page will not invent any of them.

What the data does show is spread inside each proxy series.

File clerks run from a $31,200 10th percentile to a $63,490 90th percentile nationally; legal support workers, all other, run from $43,800 to $179,960.

Those spreads cover the whole occupation across all industries — the series counts employees, not the self-employed — so they are not an experience ladder you can read years of service off.

They tell you the market has room between a floor and a ceiling; they do not tell you which rung a given candidate occupies.

The levers you can actually observe are duties and scope, and they belong in the job description before they belong in the offer.

Entering served dates into a calendar and maintaining records is one job; independently calculating deadlines under court rules, calendaring across jurisdictions, and owning the docket when a missed date surfaces is work with more at stake — and your offer should say which one you are buying.

Practice area changes the duties mix rather than the pay data: a litigation docket and a transactional calendar are different workloads, not two prices in a table.

Firm size changes scope — whether this person owns the docket alone or supports a team — and that is your judgment from the role you have designed, not a number our research carries.

The hourly view of the data: the file clerk proxy's median is $20.96 an hour nationally and the legal support workers proxy's is $34.67 — same May 2025 release, same SOCs as above.

Whether you run the role hourly or salaried is a structure decision with a classification consequence attached, and the classification comes first.

Under the federal white-collar rules, job titles decide nothing: DOL is explicit that the specific duties and salary must meet the regulations.

If you pay this role a salary and claim an exemption, know the floor DOL's salary-levels page lists — a standard salary level of $684 per week ($35,568 a year), with the highly compensated employee total at $107,432.

The regulation's own staff-role example shows how the duties test bites: paralegals and legal assistants generally do not qualify as exempt learned professionals, because an advanced specialized degree is not a standard entry requirement in the field.

Docketing work is a different occupation, and this page draws no conclusion about it — test the actual duties and salary against the regulation and confirm the classification with employment counsel before you choose salary-plus-exemption.

Our guide to overtime rules covers the federal baseline on the staff side.

On the premium for rules-based docketing experience: no source in this research quantifies one, so the number has to come from your market, not from this page.

The workable version is to define the tiers in the job description — calendar entry versus deadline computation and docket ownership — then price the upper tier from posted ranges in your market and state it as a band in the posting.

A premium you can explain in one sentence ("this hire owns deadline calculation for every court the firm files in") is also one you can defend at review time.

No source routed for this page surveys what docketing candidates value in a package, so we will not rank perks for you.

Make the decision concrete instead: decide where the firm stands on health coverage, a retirement plan, paid leave, hybrid or remote work, and bonus eligibility — then state each one plainly in the posting and the offer letter.

Part of the package may be required disclosure rather than choice.

The posting-range statutes we verified that also require a general description of benefits alongside the range cover Washington (employers with 15 or more employees), Illinois (15 or more), Minnesota (30 or more, with ranges that may not be open-ended), Connecticut (in effect since October 1, 2026) and Colorado (compensation and benefits in all job postings under its Equal Pay for Equal Work Act).

Where your posting falls under one of those statutes, the benefits description is a disclosure, not marketing.

For what a small firm can realistically assemble — and how to build benefits without a big-company budget — see our guide to benefits small firms offer.

Work the number out before the final interview — from the proxy benchmarks above, your salary ladder and what the duties tier is worth in your market — rather than from whatever the candidate happened to earn last.

That last part is also the law in the states below, which changes how offers get made.

The states whose statutes we verified restrict the salary-history question.

California's Labor Code 432.3 applies to all employers of any size, including public employers, and bars seeking an applicant's salary history — compensation and benefits included, orally or in writing, personally or through an agent — and relying on it when deciding whether to hire or what to pay.

New York's Labor Law 194-a bars relying on an applicant's wage or salary history and requesting it as a condition of being interviewed, considered, hired or promoted, or seeking it from a current or former employer.

Illinois law makes it unlawful to screen applicants by salary history, to request it as a condition of an interview or offer, or to seek it from a current or former employer.

Massachusetts bars seeking a prospective employee's wage or salary history from the candidate or a current or former employer.

Connecticut bars asking a prospective employee's wage and salary history unless the applicant volunteers it, and Virginia and Nevada ban seeking salary history as well.

We have named the states whose statutes this research read rather than publishing a count or a complete list — many cities and other states have their own rules.

What you can ask about is expectations.

California's statute expressly lets an employer ask an applicant's salary expectation for the position, and lets you consider salary history the applicant volunteers without prompting.

California also requires you to give an applicant the position's pay scale on reasonable request, regardless of employer size — the posting duty attaches at 15 or more employees.

New York allows one narrow confirmation: after a compensation offer is made, if the applicant responds by citing prior pay to support a higher number, you may confirm that history.

Massachusetts allows confirmation only after a voluntary disclosure or after an offer with compensation has been made.

Practically: anchor the offer to your band and the duties you defined, ask expectations, and leave the candidate's history out of the decision unless a statute's exception puts it there.

If the offer includes a signing bonus with a repayment clause, check California first.

For contracts entered into on or after January 1, 2026, California's stay-or-pay law makes it unlawful to require a worker to pay a penalty, fee or cost — a quit fee or replacement-hire fee included — if employment ends.

A signing-bonus repayment clause survives only if it meets every condition in the statute's exception: a separate agreement, at least five business days to consult a lawyer, interest-free repayment prorated over no more than two years, an option to defer the bonus to the end of that period, and repayment only on a voluntary quit or a firing for misconduct — and a worker can sue over a prohibited term for actual damages or $5,000 per worker, whichever is greater.

Clawback rules in states other than California were not part of this research — have employment counsel review the clause in every state you hire in.

The offer is the last step of the hiring loop; the checks before it — what the role does, where to find candidates, screening and interviewing — are our guide to how to hire a docketing clerk.

Before the offer goes out: salary-history, posting-range and stay-or-pay rules are employment law — they change, and this page names only the statutes we verified.

Confirm the current rules for every state you hire in with your employment counsel.

Often enough to keep up with the data, because every benchmark on this page carries a date.

The OEWS figures above are the May 2025 reference period — the latest release at the time we pulled them.

When BLS publishes the next one, re-pull both proxy lines and re-date your band the same day; a range quoting a superseded release is easy for a candidate to spot.

The second trigger is competitive: pay-transparency statutes put rival ranges in postings where you can read them, so when a competing firm's posted range for a docketing clerk moves, recheck yours — the docketing clerk jobs posted here are one place to look.

When you do raise pay, tell the employee which benchmark the number came from: a defensible number is easier to pay for.

Employer information, not legal advice. The salary-history, posting-range, stay-or-pay and overtime rules named on this page are statutes and regulations that change; confirm the current rules for your state with your employment counsel and your state labor agency.