How we charge

Transparent and Affordable

We are required by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (our regulator) to display on our website as clearly as possible, and in layman’s terms, how we charge for our work.

We believe it is in everyone’s interest to be as transparent as possible about fees. What you are charged is integral to how happy you are with our work. There is no point doing a great job and then falling out with you over fees. Happy clients are good clients and the vast majority of our new work every year comes from existing clients or from their recommendations.

Speak To Our Team

Generally

Lawyers sell a combination of time and expertise. In other words, we record how much time we have spent and multiply it by an hourly rate. Our hourly rates will be discussed with you in detail as part of our client engagement process.

That said, time is not the only factor that is relevant in deciding on a fair charge. It would be unfair to you if we were so lacking in expertise that it took us ages to do a job and unfair to us if our expertise enabled us to do a job very quickly and we could not charge for that expertise.

Whatever the situation, we much prefer to discuss and agree fees before raising invoices.

Most bills you receive from lawyers show the lawyer’s fee plus amounts the lawyer has paid out on your behalf. These amounts are usually called ‘disbursements’. Examples of disbursements are charges made by the banks for moving money or charges made to us by search agencies in the conveyancing process. Once again, we will discuss likely disbursements with you in our engagement process.

Please note: where VAT is referred to, this is charged at standard rate, currently 20%.

Specifically

There are some areas of our work where we are required by the Solicitors Regulation Authority to be as specific as possible about our fees. In our practice, these areas include (for members of the public) Residential Conveyancing (see also helpful notes on Residential Conveyancing Purchase Procedure and Residential Conveyancing Sale Procedure), Probate and Employment Tribunal work and (for business clients) Debt Recovery and Employment Tribunal work.

Due to the current nature of electronic banking and the time we have to invest in verifying electronic banking payments (to defeat the risk of fraud), we make a charge of £20 plus VAT for every electronic banking payment we set up and authorise on your behalf. These charges will be added automatically to your invoices.

Please follow the links for our guidelines on fees and processes. View our terms of business for further details.

Procedures and Fees

Debt Recovery Fees

We undertake Debt Recovery work subject to prescribed hourly rates.

Probate Fees

A guide to how we charge for probate work, usually fixed fee, always clear.

Residential Conveyancing Fees

Every property transaction is different, but we’ve outlined typical conveyancing costs below to give you a useful guide.