Solicitors Fees?

[johnhamilton0]

Hi Guys,

I'm looking to appoint a solictor for the legal sides of our Limited company.

What are the charges we should expect for an hours work with a good solicitor.

I expect London may be a bit more expensive, so say coparable to cost in the South West - Bath area?

Thanks for the help.

Regards,


John.

 

[bwglaw]

The average hourly rate for a solicitor to deal with commercial matters is 180/hour. Bath is not much cheaper than London. If you use a Senior Partner you would be looking at around 195/hour. All exclusive of VAT.

I am often in Bristol/Swindon and I would be happy to assist where required. My hourly rate is a lot less. I can be contacted at the email address below


Jonathan

 

[johnhamilton0]

So fees of £80p/h + VAT are quite reasonable then for he legalities with looking at franchise agreements and similar items.

 

[bwglaw]

The rate you have stipulated is in my opinion a rate charged by legal consultancies and not the commercial rate of solicitors unless the firm of solicitors have passed your matter to a trainee solicitor who often charges around the 100/hour mark plus VAT

Are you sure they are a firm of solicitors?

Jonathan

 

[johnhamilton0]

I won't say the name, but they cater for all the legal requirements for small to medium sized businesses.

 

[bwglaw]

You will need to make your own enquiries as to whether they are adequately qualified and insured to give advice for the hourly rate they charge.

If you want me to check if they are regulated by the Law Society just PM me the details.


Jonathan

 

[Antonia @limeone.com]

Jonathan makes a good point about the qualification aspect. It is not possible to obtain professional indemnity insurance unless those providing the advice are legally qualified and have blemish free records.

Checking with the Law Society is a good way to start if you want to check out whether the business is a solicitor's practice. You can do this on both individuals and firms by visiting the Law Society web site and running a search through the database or by phoning them.

It would be a very rare law firm or even a legal consultancy which could sustain an advice business on £80 per hour. The insurance and personnel take the hourly rate up beyond this.

 

[Recover]

Further to what Jonathan posted, there is a site called Solicitors Online, on http://www.solicitors-online.com which is a Law Society maintained list of all solicitors, what they specialise in, and where they are.

To give you an idea, solicitors in that field in liverpool regularly charge 170 - 190 per hour for commercial files, and there is the old addage "you get what you pay for"

 

[bwglaw]

'you get what you pay for'

Might be true to a point but things are changing especially in the legal profession where 'legal consultancies' are becoming the 'norm'

From my experience, most of the legal work done in law firms are done by paralegals/legal executives with supervision by a qualified solicitor. I do not believe all legal consultancies are not adequately qualified or experienced so I would avoid tarring any legal consultancy with the same brush.

Many lay people do not realise that 'Legal Executives' are now recognised as qualified lawyers and are entitled to conduct some areas of litigation.

The days of the traditional law firm is about to change.

Jonathan

 

[confused]

Well, any legal stuff I need I will be speaking to Jonathan, he has already given me a great deal of help via email and I am just awaiting some final details before contacting him again to finalise things.

CALV