legal cost on collection effort of outstanding service charges

gadgets.loco

Hi - I just opened a letter last night from a law firm collecting an outstanding bill for ground rent and services charges. I have no issues with paying any admin fees, interests and reasonable legal fees. The issue I have is how much I have been charged for the legal fee.

The outstanding amount is for £610.71, the invoice was dates Jan 4, 2011 and £531.33 was for the 1/1/2011 - 31/3/2011 and was due on Jan 1, 2011. A default notice was sent to me dated Feb 11, 2011 stating that I need to ensure payment is made within the next 14 days which meant I had until Feb 25 to pay the outstanding amount. I paid the outstanding amount on Feb 28.

The collections letter is dated Feb 28 and was requiring payment of £1,032.06 by 4PM on March 9, 2011. The revised amount are made of the following:

• £610.71 - original outstanding amount
• £30.00 - admin fee for default notice
• £30.00 - admin fee for referral to solicitor
• £354.00 - legal fees
• £7.35 - interest

Again I have no issues with the fees and interest, it is the legal fee charged which equates to 58% of the original outstanding amount. What is my recourse with regards to this extortionate fee? Since I am being billed for these said fees, am I entitled to request a detail breakdown of the fee?

I have contacted the management company to see if it still possible for them to withdraw this, I am not optimistic though.

Any advice would greatly be appreciated.

Regards

RadoJo

Do you have a contract to pay the ground rent etc? Does this detail the fees which will be applied if you fail to pay on time? Solicitors charge a relatively high hourly rate, so it might be worth asking what this is in the first instance to give you a rough idea of how much work would have been involved.

PZH

gadgets.loco wrote: »

The collections letter is dated Feb 28 and was requiring payment of £1,032.06 by 4PM on March 9, 2011.

I would also decide quickly as well, or additional fees may be incurred.

gadgets.loco

Thank you for the responses. I need to dig up the agreement but I don't think it provided any details except that legal fees will apply.

The good news is that the management company was able to reverse out the collection efforts so I only need to take care of the admin fees and a £50 for the reversal. I have no issues with those fees at all.

I just did not realize that a solicitor's rate could really warrant such a high legal fee for such a short amount of time .

shaun_from_Africa

It's not only solicitors that charge high fees nowadays.

I'm in the process of getting a conservatory for my house, and due to previous work being carried out, I need planning permission for it.

I saw on my local council's website that they can provide face to face meeting to give help and advice on the process. I was going to go for this until I saw the prices that they were charging.

What will I be charged?

For 2009/10, the fee scale is as follows:

· £100 for written requests for pre-application advice
· £200 for meetings lasting up to one hour (including a written response following meeting)
· £500 for meetings lasting between one and three hours (including a written response following meeting)