Terms of Business
Standard Terms of Business
1 General
1.1 These terms, when accepted, shall constitute our agreement to act as your Solicitors with regard to any instructions received from you, unless otherwise agreed. Our agreement shall continue until terminated by us or you, or superseded in writing, or our instructions from you are concluded, or it is otherwise brought to an end.
1.2 We reserve the right to amend the terms of this agreement because of legislative or other changes. In this event, a revised agreement will be prepared and sent to you.
1.3 Additional terms may be agreed between us and these will be set out in a letter or written quotation separately. In case of any conflict between these standard business terms and the terms of any letter or written quotation from us, the terms of the letter or written quotation shall prevail.
2 Personnel
2.1 One of our Partners will be appointed your Client Partner in overall charge of the matter. He or she will have ultimate responsibility for the conduct of the matter and will discuss and resolve any difficulties which may arise.
2.2 In addition, Partners, Assistant Solicitors, Trainee Solicitors, Legal Executives or Paralegals may be assigned to undertake the day to day handling of the work and to ensure that not only is your file handled promptly and efficiently but also that the work is carried out with the right degree of expertise.
2.3 If you encounter any difficulty which cannot be resolved with either the person handling the day to day conduct of the matter, or your Client Partner, please refer to our Complaint Handling Procedure overleaf.
3 Confidentiality and Identification
3.1 Whilst we shall abide by the long established rule that everything a client discloses to his solicitor is confidential, we do have an absolute obligation under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 and the Money Laundering Regulations 2003 to report to the National Crime Intelligence Service any knowledge or suspicion relating to the involvement of the proceeds of crime (including income tax evasion) and we are precluded by law from informing you or any other person of our intention to do so.
3.2 Where a report is made to the National Crime Intelligence Service in respect of you, we are not able to continue to act for you unless and until they give their consent. We therefore reserve the right to cease acting for you in those circumstances.
3.3 Where we make a report to the National Crime Intelligence Service and you thereby suffer any loss or damage, we shall not be liable for any loss or consequential loss suffered by you or any third party where our decision to report to the National Crime Intelligence Service was made in good faith.
3.4 We are required by law to establish the identity of our clients at the time of instructions. Without satisfactory evidence of your identity, we reserve the right to decline instructions.
4 Cost
4.1 At the outset of your instructions and from time to time, we may ask you for monies on account of our fees and disbursements. In the case of disbursements, we shall generally ask you to put us in funds before we undertake the work and incur our liability to a third party for these expenses.
4.2 In the event of any account or request for payment on account not being met, we reserve the right to decline to act further, not only in respect of the matter on which any account or request for payment remains outstanding but also in respect of any other matter in which we have accepted instructions from you.
4.3 You may set a limit to the fees and disbursements (excluding VAT) which we may incur without further reference to you. This must be in writing. If you do not, however, no limit shall apply.
4.4 We can, if required, provide details of the time spent and the costs incurred at any point in the matter.
4.5 Details of our current hourly charges will be provided separately.
4.6 When making a charge for our services, our professional rules oblige us to have regard to the following.
4.6.1 generally, the time spent by the Partners and staff, for example, on the telephone, writing letters and emails, dealing with documents, in consideration and preparation or in meetings, travelling or at Court. The minimum unit of chargeable time is six minutes; and
4.6.2 particularly, the complexity of the matter or the novelty of the questions raised, the skill, labour, specialised knowledge and responsibility involved, the number and importance of the documents prepared or perused, the placewhere and the circumstances in which the business or any part is transacted, its value, and the overall importance of the matter to the client.
4.7 Whilst our charges are calculated generally by reference to the time spent, we reserve the right to add extra sum, a “mark-up”, to our hourly charges to reflect the factors referred to in 4.6.2 above, when calculating a reasonable fee for the work undertaken. VAT is added at the appropriate rate.
4.8 In the event of your instructions proving abortive, we will render an account for the work undertaken.
4.9 We reserve the right to change our charging rates from time to time to take into account changes in overheads, inflation, or other factors.
4.10 To keep you closely apprised of the incidence and level of costs in the matter, we shall render accounts to you on a regular basis. Whilst the aim in doing so is to make a charge for all work undertaken up to the date of the invoice, some adjustment may be needed when the matter is finally completed.
4.11 Save where otherwise agreed in writing, our account payment terms are one month and we reserve the right to decline to undertake further work if our accounts are not paid within this period and if appropriate, to apply to be removed from the Court Record as acting as your Solicitor.
4.12 For your information, payment of our accounts or monies requested on account can be made by Standing Order arrangement with your Bankers, as well as by cheque or in cash in the usual way.
4.13 Interest is charged on all outstanding accounts, including disbursements, at the rate of 4% above the base rate of National Westminster Bank PLC, save that where interest may be claimed under the Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998 (as amended) interest is charged at the Reference Rate plus 8% and compensation is payable.
4.14 At the conclusion of your instructions, no documentation or property belonging to you will be released by us until all outstanding accounts have been settled in full.
5 Payment of Money
5.1 We will not accept whether as settlement of a bill or payment on account or as payment for disbursements sums in excess of £250.00 in cash.
5.2 Our bankers are instructed not to accept any payments direct into our account in cash.
5.3 Any payment which you request us to make direct to your bank account will incur a fee at our standard rate which will be deducted from the monies remitted.
6 Payment of Interest to You
6.1 We shall pay you interest on monies standing to your credit on client accounts in your name with this firm in accordance with the Solicitors’ Accounts Rules 1991 as amended by the Solicitors’ Accounts (Deposit Interest and Commissions) Amendment Rules 1992. The minimum figure upon which interest is payable is £1,000 if held by us for a period of at least eight weeks. The minimum period in respect of which interest (on a specified sum) is payable is one week if the sum of money exceeds £20,000. We shall account to you for interest upon sums greater than £20,000 held for less than one week if it is fair and reasonable to do so in the circumstances.
6.2 Interest will be calculated in accordance with the Rules in 6.1 above or (if less) the rate available to us for the particular sum held less, in respect of each amount of interest as and when calculated, the sum of £20.00 to take in account the costs of administration.
7 Commissions
7.1 We shall disclose to you all commissions earned by us in relation to your instructions and save where otherwise agreed in writing, we shall retain the same.
7.2 In the event of any commissions earned by us becoming repayable through clawback for whatever reason, we shall be entitled to reimbursement from you of all commissions so repayable.
8 Court Proceedings
If Court proceedings are commenced, please note the following:-
8.1 Whatever the outcome, you will be responsible for paying this firm’s fees, disbursements and VAT in full, regardless of any Order for costs made against your opponent.
8.2 It is probable that, if you lose the case, you will have to pay your opponent’s costs as well as your own.
8.3 Even if you win, it is unlikely that the Court will order your opponent to pay the full amount of your own costs, disbursements and VAT and in particular those costs will be limited to those which were reasonably incurred and proportionate in amount.
8.4 If your opponent is publicly funded, you may not recover your costs, even if you are successful at Court.
8.5 Regardless of the final outcome of the case, you may be ordered to pay your opponent’s costs of any pre-trial hearing and those costs may be assessed on the day of the hearing and be ordered to be paid by you straight away.
9 Storage/Release of Original File Papers
At the conclusion of your instructions, if you require the return of any file papers, please let us know when you arrange payment of our final account. If not, we will store them for a limited period prior to destruction.
10 Proper Law
This agreement shall be subject to the laws of England and you agree to submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the Courts of England and Wales.
Complaint Handling Procedure
We at Brain Chase Coles hope and believe that you will be well satisfied with the service which you receive from this practice.
We do recognise that occasionally problems arise which may cause you to be dissatisfied with the service you are receiving.
If, during the course of a matter which is being handled on your behalf, you consider that there is some problem with the service provided, you should first of all try to resolve that problem which the person who is handling your case, or your Client Partner. All staff are required to respond promptly to any such complaint.
If for any reason you are not able to resolve the problem with the persons mentioned above, then you should refer your complaint to the Partner who is in charge of the firm’s complaints procedures, Mr N G Massey-Chase. You may contact him either by letter or by telephone and, if necessary, he will arrange to meet you and in any event, he will investigate the matter fully and give as quick a response as possible. In the event of a complaint against Mr N G Massey-Chase, the complaint should be referred to Mr J M Coles.
At all times we shall endeavour to respond positively to dissatisfaction which is considered to be justified and will, in appropriate circumstances, offer an apology, give a full explanation, transfer the matter to another person if there has been a personality clash, or propose a costs concession.
You will receive in writing the Firm’s final response to the complaint.
If, following this final response, you still remain dissatisfied then you may refer the case to the Legal Complaints Service, which is the independent complaints handling body of the Law Society. Their address is 113 Chancery Lane, London, WC2A 1PL and their website www.legalcomplaints.org.uk
This firm is regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority.
