If the situation ever arrives that you need to make bond to get out of jail, you will have a couple of options. The first is to call home and hope that someone is there who is willing to call a bail bondsman and work out the details for you to be released from jail. If you have no one at home, your next option is to call from a list that is available at most jails. From that list, you should be able to make contact with a bail bondsman who can help you. He will ask you what you have been charged with and how much bail the judge has placed upon you. You need to have cash for ten per cent of the total bond that the judge is demanding for you to be released from jail. The judge decides based on your previous record and the charges that you will be facing, how much bond to set upon you. If he thinks that you might be a wealthy person who could easily leave the country and forfeit the money, he will place a higher amount on you to make sure that you stay in the country and show up for your hearing. If you are successful in contacting an agent who agrees to make your bond, he will come to the jail and arrange for your departure. He gets his percentage right then or you don't leave the jail. Paying the ten percent of your bond means having that money on you or having someone come to the jail with it. The money that you post is forfeit. The entire bond that the bail bondsman signs for is forfeit if you don't show for your hearing.
Posting a bond is serious business and means that you are being trusted to appear at your hearing once you are out of jail on bond. The agent is also bonded which means that he has to guarantee the total amount if you don't appear at your hearing.
There is no use trying to call a lawyer to post bond. Even a family lawyer who you know very well would need you to handle your situation with a bail bondsman. The system works fine if the judge has agreed to bond. If you don't know whether the judge has agreed to let you out on bond, your agent can quickly find out.
He will also let you know what it has been set at and how much money he needs to post your bond and get you out of jail as quickly as possible. The fact that it might be in the middle of the night when you get put in jail should not deter you from trying to make your call to an all night bail bondsman. There are agents who are on call twenty-four hours a day to take care of felony, misdemeanor, criminal appeal, and immigration bonds.