Legal cover via home insurance: lawyer at a decent rate?

sebtomato

Hi,
My home insurance is through Aviva, and I would like to use the legal cover purchased to deal with an employment issue.
However, the conditions states that, if I chose my own lawyer, they will only pay the same rate as their own lawyer, so a maximum of £100 per hour.
I don't know any good employment lawyer that would only charge £100 per hour (regardless of whether such person is chosen by Aviva or by me). For £100, it would be the typical rate of a trainee. Rate for someone with 4+ years experience would be £250+.
How do I get them to pay a decent rate (otherwise, what's the point of that legal cover)?
Thanks,
S.

davidmcn

Bear in mind the insurers get heavily discounted rates (they're effectively bulk buying through their contracts with their panel solicitors) so I wouldn't compare with the "full" rate you'd be offered as a normal punter (and they want to encourage you to use their panel firm, who in reality are probably getting more than £100/hour). But the short answer is that the cover doesn't allow you to pick and choose in the way you want, you're expected to use their preferred solicitors.

Sandtree

The point is that you use their panel solicitors. Even if you only commit to using 1 person full time for 6 months law firms will give you a 50% discount without any haggling... now imagine how many lawyers an insurance giant like Aviva engages over what duration?

But you mention you want to buy it for an employment issue which suggests the issue already exists and therefore would not be covered by the policy if you only buy it today. Like all consumer insurance, it will only cover you for things yet to happen.

sebtomato

Sandtree said:

The point is that you use their panel solicitors. Even if you only commit to using 1 person full time for 6 months law firms will give you a 50% discount without any haggling... now imagine how many lawyers an insurance giant like Aviva engages over what duration?

But you mention you want to buy it for an employment issue which suggests the issue already exists and therefore would not be covered by the policy if you only buy it today. Like all consumer insurance, it will only cover you for things yet to happen.

I have had the home insurance/cover for 6 months. Had the same policy (same insurer) last year too, so the recent employment issue should fall within the policy.
I understand the bulk buying and discounts they may get. However, they do state that they pay their panel solicitors £100 an hour on the policy, and therefore can pay third party lawyers too, at the same rate. Even at 50% discount, this would seem quite cheap.

davidmcn

sebtomato said:

Sandtree said:

The point is that you use their panel solicitors. Even if you only commit to using 1 person full time for 6 months law firms will give you a 50% discount without any haggling... now imagine how many lawyers an insurance giant like Aviva engages over what duration?

But you mention you want to buy it for an employment issue which suggests the issue already exists and therefore would not be covered by the policy if you only buy it today. Like all consumer insurance, it will only cover you for things yet to happen.

I understand the bulk buying and discounts they may get. However, they do state that they pay their panel solicitors £100 an hour on the policy, and therefore can pay third party lawyers too, at the same rate. Even at 50% discount, this would seem quite cheap.

Doesn't mean you'll get poor quality advice. The same lawyer can be charging a wide range of rates depending on the type of work and who's asking.

Sandtree

sebtomato said:
I have had the home insurance/cover for 6 months. Had the same policy (same insurer) last year too, so the recent employment issue should fall within the policy.

I understand the bulk buying and discounts they may get. However, they do state that they pay their panel solicitors £100 an hour on the policy, and therefore can pay third party lawyers too, at the same rate. Even at 50% discount, this would seem quite cheap.

Sorry, I misread your original post and thought it said you were thinking of buying the LE cover.

£100/hr is a blended rate, most work will be done by paralegals who even ordinarily will be in the £100-£200 range even before you get a big discount for bulk buying. There will be some work done by an associate in the £200-£300 range and oversight from a senior associate in the £250-£400.

I've not negotiated rates for a LE contract for Home insurance but as I say a magic circle firm was willing to give a 50% discount on an associate for a 6 month period you'd logically expect the discount for taking on a much larger number of people for much longer would be more.

Insurers don't want you to use your own solicitor, the more work they push through panel that have pre-agreed SLAs etc the bigger the discount they give. They cannot mandate that you use their lawyers so instead create a near impossible task for you to get your solicitors to agree to the rate for a one off job that the insurer gets via a contract worth £X0m per year.