Our charges

We endeavour to be as flexible as we can with our charging arrangements which generally depend on the nature of work that we are required to undertake. Here are some of the options that may be available to you:

• The traditional method of charging whereby our charges are calculated mainly by reference to the time actually spent by our solicitors and staff in respect of any work which we do on your behalf charged at an hourly rate with VAT and any expenses payable in addition.  We consider our hourly rates to be extremely competitive given the experience of our solicitors.  We do our best to provide clients with estimates of the total costs that are likely to be payable although it is not always possible to give a reliable estimate at the outset when it is not known how much work will have to be done.  It is standard practice to ask clients to pay sums of money from time to time on account of the charges and expenses which are expected in the following weeks or months which we also find helps clients in budgeting for costs as well as keeping them informed of the legal expenses which are being incurred. We aim to ensure that our total costs are proportionate taking into account the amount or value of any money or property involved, the importance of the matter to the client, the particular complexity of the matter or the difficulty or novelty of the questions raised, the skill, effort, specialist knowledge and responsibility involved and the time spent on the case.

• It is not uncommon for people to have legal expenses insurance either as an extension to a motor insurance policy, a home contents policy or specialist legal expenses insurance.  If you have insurance of this nature your legal expenses insurers may agree to our being instructed on your behalf.

• If you are a member of a trade union you may be entitled to free legal advice and some employers provide legal costs insurance cover for employees.

• You will no doubt have heard of no win/no fee agreements.  The correct term for these agreements is Conditional Fee Agreements. The most important feature of such an agreement is that if you are unsuccessful with your claim you will generally not have to pay any costs to this firm.  In exchange to us taking the risk for not being paid for any of our work if you are unsuccessful we are entitled to a success fee if you win and this success fee is claimed as a percentage increase on our hourly charging rate.  If you win your case we confirm, subject to certain exceptions, that we will reduce your liability for our charges to the amount actually received from your opponent or ordered or agreed to be paid by your opponent for our costs.  This option is generally suitable for cases where the prospects of winning the claim and successfully recovering any money from an opponent are high, such as accident and injury claims where the opponent is generally insured and the facts  can be easily established.

• Contingency Fee Agreements are no win/no fee agreements but differ to Conditional Fee Agreements in the sense that our fees are calculated based on a percentage of any award of damages received by the client. These are appropriate for cases where our costs cannot be recovered from your opponent in the event of a successful claim (criminal injuries compensation claims and employment tribunal claims) and the prospects of winning the case are high and the client is likely to receive a reasonable amount of damages.

• We occasionally agree to charge on a fixed fee basis.

Please note that we are unable to undertake work for clients who are eligible for Legal Aid (more properly known as Community Legal Service Funding) and wish to benefit from this type of funding instead of utilising one of the above charging arrangements. Your Legal Aid eligibility can be provisionally assessed at LegalAidCalculator.

We accept payment by way of cash, cheque or direct bank transfers but we are not currently able to accept payment by debit or credit card.