Have I been ripped off by my conveyancer?

yesway

I am remortgaging and found the cheapest conveyancer I could through YBS website. They quoted a fee of £437.36 inc disbursements (it is a leasehold flat making the fee slightly more expensive).
They have since started work and have just sent me a wad of documentation (full of spelling mistakes!).
I now find that they want to charge me
£90 more for land registry fee as the original quote only included a £40 "donation" to that
£39 for telegraphic transfers
£35 for stationary / faxes / phone calls!
£20 for asking land registry for a copy of the lease.

If I pull our now I think they will charge me anyway as they have started the work.

Is it normal behaviour for solicitors to add £184 to their bill without any extra work being done?

daveyjp

It depends what they mean by "disbursements" - check the small print.

yesway

They have included in disbursments:
search fees £5
land registry fee £90
telegraphic transfer £5
OCEs title and plan £6
HMLR £4
Bankruptcy search £4 per person
Online ID verification per person £11.98
Legal fee £265 + VAT at £46.38
They then added it all up to make £437.36 which means they excluded £15.98 as it is a joint application so the per person amounts are greater.

But it's the extra £184 that I'm really bothered about esp when they are now saying the original fee only included £40 towards land registry even though it explicitly said £90 before.
And they want to add another £39 for telegraphic transfer on top of the £5 originally quoted.
Plus £35 for sundries - I mean honestly, they surely should include paper and pens in their legal fee! And how the hell can they spend that much on stationary for one case!

ahappychappie

Hi,

I too am looking at remortgaging with the YBS, looking at previous posts people have been quoted legal costs of £117.

Excuse my ignorance, but I thought legal requirements on a remortgage were minimal, thus wasn't expecting anything above the £117 - I therefore presume £117 is for me to pay YBS legal team their costs for processing my application and I'll then have to engage my own solicitor to complete any legal requirements from YBS?

It seems an excessive cost when First Direct and many others do not charge legal costs for a 'standard remortgage'.

Thanks...

GMS

ahappychappie wrote: »

Hi,

I too am looking at remortgaging with the YBS, looking at previous posts people have been quoted legal costs of £117.

Excuse my ignorance, but I thought legal requirements on a remortgage were minimal, thus wasn't expecting anything above the £117 - I therefore presume £117 is for me to pay YBS legal team their costs for processing my application and I'll then have to engage my own solicitor to complete any legal requirements from YBS?

It seems an excessive cost when First Direct and many others do not charge legal costs for a 'standard remortgage'.

Thanks...

£117 will be an estimate.

Check with lenders offering free legals exactly what they cover. Legal fees are one thing as these could be carried out by employed staff, but disbursements can cost money and could well be the customer's responsibility.

When getting a quote for legal fees from anywhere you need to get a total, not just legals.