Our Commitment To You
Elliott Bridgman Solicitors value your instructions and our aim is to help you achieve your goals quickly and effectively in an approachable and cost efficient way. This document sets the Terms on which we agree to act for you.
Our responsibilities include advising you on the law, following your instructions, reviewing your matter regularly and discussing with you whether the potential outcomes justify the expense and risks involved with your matter.
You need to provide us with clear and timely instructions, the information and documents required for us to do our work and funds required.
As a client of this Firm you have the responsibility to:
-Notify the Firm if any of the information you have provided at any stage is false, inaccuarate or misleading.
-Advise us of any change in your circumstances that may result in you being unable to pay our fees.
-Respond to all correspondence within a reasonable time.
-Provide us with clear and timely instructions.
-Be respectful towards staff members and patient with the legal process. We appreciate timescales can be frustrating and stressful but sometimes circumstances beyond our control can cause delays to your legal matter. Abuse and a lack of respect towards staff members will not be tolerated and could result in us being unable to continue to act for you.
Unless you tell us otherwise you agree to us communicating with you including sending bills and other confidential information by normal unencrypted email using the email address(es) you have given us from time to time. You should be aware that there is a risk that emails (in particular when unencrypted) may be intercepted, delayed, corrupted or may fail to be delivered.
We make reasonable attempts to exclude from our emails any virus or other defect that might harm a computer or IT system. You undertake to act likewise with any electronic communications you send to us. Neither you nor we shall have any liability to each other in respect of any claim or loss arising in connection with such a virus or defect in an electronic communication other than where such claim or loss arises from bad faith or wilful default.
It is a condition of our retainer that all bills, interim and final, are paid within 14 days of the invoice date. If a bill is not paid in full within that period we may charge you interest on any amount outstanding from the due date until the date the bill is paid at the rate of interest prescribed for judgments from time to time. In the case of commercial debts we reserve the right to claim interest and recovery costs pursuant to the Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998.
Where an account is overdue we are entitled to retain any files and documents belonging to you which are in our possession until our account is settled. We also reserve the right to cease working on this and any other matters on which we are acting for you.
In some cases and particularly when litigation is involved or when we may need to incur substantial expense on your behalf we may require you to provide a payment on account of the future likely costs and disbursements.
If instructions for a piece of work are given by more than one person or company we may recover our fees, disbursements and Value Added Tax from any one or more of them. This includes situations where one person or company instructs us on behalf of another.
If arrangements are made for a third party to pay any of our fees or disbursements or a court orders a third party to pay any part of our fees or disbursements, you remain liable to pay them to the extent that the third party does not pay them when due.
If an account remains unpaid and we commence legal proceedings against you in order to recover the sums you owe us then we will be entitled to recover from you the legal costs that we incur in connection with those proceedings at our standard hourly rates, together with all disbursements (including fees of counsel and any other lawyers engaged by us in our attempts to recover payment from you)
Unless we have agreed otherwise our charges will be based on the time spent on your matter, applying our hourly charging rates as applicable.
We reserve the right to charge separately for photocopying, printing, telephone calls, faxes, emails, electronic funds transfers, catering, other support services, travel, courier and other incidental expenses.
Where applicable we will charge VAT on our charges and expenses.
Our hourly charge rates are reviewed each year. We will notify you of the rates if they change and you will then be bound by them. If you do not accept the new rates after review we reserve the right not to continue acting for you.
Any costs estimate we give at any time is a guide to assist you in budgeting. It is not intended to be fixed unless that is specifically agreed in writing.
Any fixed fee, capped fee or other fee arrangement we agree with you, or any costs estimate we give you, is based on the scope of the work anticipated and our assumptions about the matter at the time it is agreed or given. If the scope of the work changes or the assumptions change it will no longer apply. In that case we will discuss a revised fee arrangement or estimate with you.
Unless agreed to the contrary we will be entitled to send you interim invoices at monthly intervals or at any other reasonable times for the work performed to date together with any disbursements we have incurred on your behalf and a final invoice when the work has been completed.
You will be responsible to us for our fees and disbursements regardless of any order obtained for payment of your costs by another party. Our costs are likely to exceed the sum which you could recover from any other party to the proceedings. You should also bear in mind that you may be ordered to pay the costs of the other party.
We only accept cash up to a limit of £500. If clients circumvent this policy by depositing cash direct with our bank we reserve the right to charge for any additional checks we deem necessary regarding the source of the funds.
You may end your instructions to us at any time by letting us know.
We may decide to stop acting for you only with good reason, for example, if you do not provide us with funds on account or there is a conflict of interest. We will give you reasonable notice if we decide to stop acting for you. If we do have to stop acting for you we will explain your options for pursuing the matter and will work with you to minimise disruption to your matter.
However if we stop acting for any reason you will be required to pay for the expenses we have incurred and for the work we have done, even if the original agreement or understanding had been that we would only bill you on completion of the matter. If fees are unpaid all of your files or papers will not be released to you until your account is discharged in full.
We will normally credit you with interest on any funds we hold in our client account on your behalf. Our policy on the payment of interest is as follows.
Interest on client money will be calculated from the date the funds are received by us and cleared to the date that we issue the cheque to you. If a telegraphic transfer of funds is required than an additional charge will be made for any bank cost of transferring the funds to you.
Balances of £5.00 or less remaining on account at the end of a matter will automatically be transferred to our Charity Account unless you inform us otherwise.
We will not be liable to repay any money that we hold for you in our client account at Lloyds Bank which is lost as a result of a failure of the bank.
If we are instructed by joint clients then all clients are jointly and severally liable for our fees, notwithstanding any agreement between you as to how you will share the costs. This means that we will be able to look to one client only or to each of our clients to pay the whole of or any balance of any unpaid fees.
Instructions are understood to be for the purposes of all of those instructing us. We will act on instructions from any one of those clients unless you instruct us otherwise. Liability to pay our costs is joint (all the clients together) and several (each may be liable for the whole amount).
If instructions are given on behalf of a client we are entitled to assume that the person giving the instructions has lawful authority to instruct us. If not, then that person will be liable to us as if they were our client.
After the end of the relevant matter please let us know if you would like us to send your file of papers to you. Otherwise we will keep our file of your papers in storage. We will normally destroy it six years after the date of the final bill we send to you for the matter without further reference to you and by agreeing to these terms you authorise us to do so. We will not destroy documents you ask us to hold in safe custody such as deeds, wills and other important original documents.
We will take care of your deeds, documents and other papers as long as they remain in our possession. However should any of them be lost or damaged as a result of events beyond our reasonable control we will not be liable for their replacement or for any resultant loss.
If we retrieve papers or documents from storage in relation to continuing or new instructions to act for you we will not normally charge for such retrieval. However we may charge you for time spent retrieving, reading, copying or working on such papers where that is to comply with your instructions in relation to the retrieved papers.
We use the information you provide primarily for the provision of legal services to you and for related purposes including:
Our use of that information is subject to your instructions, Data Protection Law and our duty of confidentiality.
Please note that our work for you may require us to pass on such information to third parties such as expert witnesses and other professional advisers including sometimes advisers appointed by another party to your matter. We may also give such information to others who perform services for us, such as typing or photocopying. Our practice may be audited or checked by our accountants or our regulator or by other organisations. We do not normally copy such information to anyone outside the European Economic Area however we may do so when the particular circumstances of your matter so require. All such third parties are required to maintain confidentiality in relation to your files.
You have a right of access under Data Protection Law to the personal data that we hold about you. We seek to keep that personal data correct and up to date. You should let us know if you believe the information we hold about you needs to be corrected or updated.
We have appointed Mark Bridgman as our representative for the purposes of the Data Protection Act.
Any personal data we receive from you for the purposes of our Money Laundering checks will be processed only for the purposes of preventing Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing or as otherwise permitted by law or with your express consent.
You consent to us retaining such data for longer than the five year statutory period, unless you tell us otherwise.
We are professionally and legally obliged to keep your affairs confidential. However, solicitors may be required by statute to make a disclosure to the National Crime Agency where they know or suspect that a transaction may involve Money Laundering or Terrorist Financing. If we make a disclosure in relation to your matter we may not be able to tell you that a disclosure has been made. We may have to stop working on your matter for a period of time and may not be able to tell you why.
We limit our liability to you for claims for breach of contract, breach of duty, negligence and for claims otherwise arising out of or in connection with our engagement or the services we provide, in the ways described below.
Our liability to you shall be limited to £3 million.
This liability cap will apply to our aggregate liability to you together with any associated party for whom you are acting as agent in relation to the relevant matter on any basis.
Proportional liability
In addition to the other limitations in this document, where we and/or third parties are responsible for any loss suffered by you, our liability for that loss will be limited to a fair proportion of your total loss calculated by reference to the extent of our responsibility. If you have engaged others to represent or advise you on a matter in which we are involved and you agree with any of them that their liability to you will be limited, in order that our position is not adversely affected by any such limitation of their liability, you agree that our liability to you will not exceed the amount which would have applied in the absence of that limitation.
Third party liability
If you start proceedings against us for loss or damage and there is another person (for example, another adviser) who is liable (or potentially liable) to you in respect of the same loss or damage, then you will (if we so request) join them into the proceedings. This is subject to any legal prohibition against your joining them in that way.
No claim against individual employees/partners
We have an interest in limiting the personal liability of employees, consultants and partners. Accordingly you agree that you will not bring any claim against any individual employee, consultant or partner in respect of losses which you suffer or incur, arising out of or in connection with our engagement or the services we provide. The provisions of this paragraph will not limit or exclude the firm’s liability for the acts or omissions of our employees, consultants or partners.
The provisions of the above paragraph are intended for the benefit of our employees, consultants and partners but the terms of our engagement may be varied without the consent of all or any of those persons.
Limitation on exclusions
The above exclusions and limitations will not operate to exclude or limit any liability which cannot lawfully be limited or excluded. In particular they do not limit liability for fraud, nor for causing death or personal injury by negligence, nor for negligence in contentious business, insofar as the Solicitors Act 1974 s 60(5) precludes the exclusion of such liability.
As explained in our accompanying engagement letter, if you are not happy with our service or the bill, we hope to be able to resolve the matter to your satisfaction.
Details of our complaints procedure are available on our website or on request.
However if you are not satisfied with our handling of your complaint you may be able to ask the Legal Ombudsman to consider your complaint.
Legal Ombudsman Contact Details:
Address: PO Box 6167, Slough, SL1 0EH
Telephone: 0300 555 0333
Email: enquiries@legalombudsman.org.uk
Website: www.legalombudsman.org.uk
Normally you will need to bring a complaint to the Legal Ombudsman within six months of receiving a final written response from us about your complaint and within one year from the date of the act or omission about which you are complaining, occurring or within one year of when you should reasonably have realised that there was a cause for complaint.
As well as your right to complain about any of our bills under our complaints procedure you can also apply for the bill to be assessed by the court under Part III of the Solicitors Act 1974, in which case the Legal Ombudsman may not consider your complaint.
For more information on the Legal Ombudsman rules and requirements please see their scheme rules dated April 2023 which are available on their website.
In addition to the Legal Ombudsman the SRA can help you if you are concerned about our behaviour. This could be for things like dishonesty, taking or losing your money or treating you unfairly because of your age, a disability or other characteristic. However the SRA are not able to deal with issues of poor service.
Solicitors Regulation Authority Contact Details:
Address: The Cube, 199 Wharfside Street, Birmingham, B1 1RN
Telephone: 0370 606 2555
Email: report@sra.org.uk
Any barrister or other professional we instruct on your behalf should have their own complaints process. So if you are not happy with their service you can complain to them direct but please let us know. We can tell you how to make your complaint if they have not given you that information themselves.
Our advice is for your benefit only. Save as expressly set out, our agreement with you is not intended to confer rights on any third parties whether pursuant to the Contracts (Rights of Third Parties) Act 1999 or otherwise.
Elliott Bridgman Solicitors is not authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority (“FCA”). We are regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (“SRA”), which is the independent regulatory arm of the Law Society of England and Wales. If you are unhappy with any investment advice or insurance advice you receive from us you should raise your concerns with the SRA.
Financial Services and Markets Act (“FSMA”)
If while we are acting for you, you need advice on investments we may have to refer you to someone who is authorised to provide the necessary advice. However we may provide some limited investment advice services where these are closely linked to the legal work we are doing for you. This is because we are regulated by the SRA, which is a designated professional body for the purposes of the FSMA.
Our role in any transaction is that of legal adviser and it is not part of our function to give advice on the merits of any transaction in investments. When providing our services we will assume that you have decided or will decide to negotiate or enter into any such transaction solely on the advice you may receive from a person authorised under the FSMA. No communication from us is intended or should be construed as an invitation or inducement to you or to anyone else to engage in investment activity.
Insurance Distribution
We are not authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority. However we are included on the register maintained by the Financial Conduct Authority so that we can carry on insurance distribution activity which is broadly the advising on, selling and administration of insurance contracts. This part of our business including making arrangements for complaints or redress if something goes wrong is regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority. The register can be accessed via the Financial Conduct Authority website.
This agreement and any dispute or claim arising out of or in connection with it or its subject matter or formation (including non-contractual disputes or claims) shall be governed by the law of England and Wales, and the Courts of England and Wales shall have exclusive jurisdiction over any such dispute or claim.
Our lawyer-client relationship will be considered terminated upon our completion of the specific services that you have retained us to perform or if open-ended services are to be provided, when more than six months have elapsed from the last time we furnished any billable services to you.
The fact that we may inform you from time to time of developments in the law which may be of interest to you, by e-mail, newsletter or otherwise, should not be understood as a revival of a lawyer-client relationship. We have no obligation to inform you of such developments in the law unless we are specifically engaged to do so.
Under the SRA Indemnity Insurance Rules we are required to take out and maintain qualifying insurance. Details of our insurance are available on request.
We shall not be liable to you if we are unable to perform our services as a result of any cause beyond our reasonable control.
These Terms of Business were last amended on 10th November 2023.