Dispute with Solicitor bill

Murphy38

I have been dealing with a solicitor for conveyancing work as well as a Deed of Family Arrangment. At the beginning he quoted his fees in a Client Care Letter but I have now received the bill at the end of all the work and he has charged the fees he quoted but on top of that he has charged photocopying, postage, telephone calls etc. so for two failed sales and one completed sale he has charged a total of £567 plus VAT so £680! He also quoted an average of 2 hours work for the Deed of Family arrangement but he has charged me for 3 hours work, again plus photocopying! In his terms of business he states that he may charge for photocopying but in his client care letter he quotes fixed fees plus disbursements and he then explains that disbursements will be fees that he has paid for on our behalf such as land registry fees. I just want to find out if this is normals to charge for photocoping etc on top of a fixed fee?

pcgtron

to be honest, £680 for a conveyancing sale and a deed of family arrangement is not bad at all

Murphy38

No, that was just for the photocopying and postage for 2 failed sales and a completed sale. In total for the whole bill, so for two failed sales, a completed sale and a deed of family arrangement he charged me £3229.42!!

pcgtron

Holy !!!!. £680 for photocopying and phone calls!
Do you have a breakdown of how he achieved this price. Were you on the phone to him for hours?

G_M

This is truly sneeky.

If the agreement was 'fixed fee + disbursements' he should not be charging for photocopying. It is not a disbursement, it is part of his own costs (covered by the fixed fee).

I would look up the internal complaints procedure for the firm and follow that.

Failing that, go to

http://www.lawsociety.org.uk/for-the-public/faqs/complaining-about-a-solicitor/

http://www.sra.org.uk/consumers/consumers.page

Murphy38

We never had one phone call, it was all done via email. The one time I had to call him about something urgent I spoke to a rather stroppy lady who just said she would email him to call me! he never did! There is no breakdown for the photocoping or calls, it just literally says that. It's the photocopying that is the largest amount and when I disputed this he said he has to print every single email communication for his records and as the sale of the property went on for two years (because we had two failed sales) then there were a lot of emails.

So for the first failed sale he charged me £250 plus £52 photocoping plus £17 postage and telephone plus VAT for the second failed sale he charged me £250 plus £275 which was for additional enquiries which he reluctantly agreed to plus £138.50 for photocopying and £40.30 for calls and postage plus VAT and for the final completed sale he charged me £475 which were the agreed fees plus £289 for photocopying and £30.20 for calls and postage plus VAT then for the Deed of family arrangement he charged me £750 for 3 hours work although he said an average case was 2 hours plus £61 for photocopying and £3 on calls and postage. I would also like to point out I have never received anything by post either, all forms were emailed to me!

I have disputed this with him but he has said that it states in his terms of business that I would be charged for photocopying but it just says I 'may' be charged and in the client care letter he quotes fixed fees plus disbursements and says that disbursements are payments made on my behalf, not for photocopying!! There is no complaints procedure on his terms of business it just says to contact him for the policy but I have asked for it several times now but have not been told the procedure so I guess me next step is legal obudsman but I just wanted to find out if this was normal, being charged extra for photocopying?

Murphy38

that should read *we reluctantly agreed*, not *he*

ConfusedofYorkshire

That a hell of a lot of photocopying!! Really doesn't seem normal or right to me from what you've said.

Eviesmummy

Our starightforward house purchase is costing £720 plus an extra £250 for the searches, so even with the added extras I don't think you've had too bad a deal.

silvercar

Printing out emails isn't photocopying. Photocopying is duplicating an existing hard copy.

Printing out every email is unnecessary, legal firms should be digitally storing correspondence.

TBagpuss

I agree. Printing out e-mails is not photocopying. Either these could be stored online, or printing them off is part of the firm's overheads, just like paying for letterheaded paper and stamps is.

If they say they charge for photocopying then I would expect that to apply to things such as if you were to request hard copies of all searches, rather than being willing for them to scan and e-mail them to you, or if there were deeds or other documents which needed to be copied.

I would normally expect phonecalls to be included in any set fee, and iof they are not, it is reasonable for you to ask for breakdown of the number of calls.

What is the postage fo? Again, normally that would be a buisness overhead. I would only expect it to be charged separately if there were unusual circumstances - for instance if you demanded that everything was sent to you by special delivery, or if things were sent to you multiple times because you kept losing them, and even then I'd expect an explicit warning that they were going to start charging.

With costs, you should be told at the outset what these are likely to be, you should also be given an update periodically (Is the firm Lexcel Accredited? If so, you should have been getting costs updates at least every 6 months)

The firm should also have told you as soon as they became aware that the initial estimate was no longer correct and should have given you an updated estimate.

Calls and postage may relate to calls and documents sent to third parties as well as any to you, but on the face of it, they have charged you over £600 more than their original estimate (if I have understood you correctly), and while the fees may be reasonable in themselves, if they dealt with 2 abortive sales as well as the one which went through, they should have kept you updated about the costs position.