Solicitor overcharged me

Anikats

Hello, I would like some advice about my situation: 

I instructed a solicitor in early 2025 regarding a simple neighbour boundary issue. During the free initial consultation he estimated that reviewing my documents and providing legal advice would take around 2-3 hours. I later received three invoices(May, June and July) totalling £2,215.50+VAT for 6 hours 36 minutes of time, even though I never received any written advice or clear guidance about my case. The firm’s own billing records show that only about 1 hour 18 minutes (20%) was spent on genuine legal work such as reviewing papers and drafting one short letter to the other side. The remaining five-plus hours (around 80%) were billed for administrative activities – reading or sending short emails, reviewing costs, and preparing invoices. He charged me £42 for my two-sentence email to him confirming I paid their bill which took him 6 minutes to read. He also billed four separate times for the “bill preparation” itself.

Do you think that is normal for a solicitor service? What can I do?

MeteredOut

Based on what you've said here, I'd certainly be challenging some of the bill entries. Have you done that?

https://www.gov.uk/challenge-solicitors-bill

Solicitors should follow the standard code of practice for what they're billing.

Anikats

Thank you @MeteredOut - no I have not tried anything yet. I paid his bills and stopped using his services. I know that solicitors services are expensive - but it feels so wrong to pay £2,215.50+VAT for almost nothing

Abbafan1972

Anikats said:

Thank you @MeteredOut - no I have not tried anything yet. I paid his bills and stopped using his services. I know that solicitors services are expensive - but it feels so wrong to pay £2,215.50+VAT for almost nothing

You won’t be able do anything then, if you paid the bills without contesting them. 

Anikats

Abbafan1972 said:

Anikats said:

Thank you @MeteredOut - no I have not tried anything yet. I paid his bills and stopped using his services. I know that solicitors services are expensive - but it feels so wrong to pay £2,215.50+VAT for almost nothing

You won’t be able do anything then, if you paid the bills without contesting them. 

Oh, okay, so it looks it is my mistake to be so naive.....
In my correspondence to the solicitor I mentioned that the bill is too much and asked for explanation - and then I was sent the itemised spreadsheet. Can something be done? 

Undervalued

Anikats said:

Hello, I would like some advice about my situation: 

I instructed a solicitor in early 2025 regarding a simple neighbour boundary issue. During the free initial consultation he estimated that reviewing my documents and providing legal advice would take around 2-3 hours. I later received three invoices(May, June and July) totalling £2,215.50+VAT for 6 hours 36 minutes of time, even though I never received any written advice or clear guidance about my case. The firm’s own billing records show that only about 1 hour 18 minutes (20%) was spent on genuine legal work such as reviewing papers and drafting one short letter to the other side. The remaining five-plus hours (around 80%) were billed for administrative activities – reading or sending short emails, reviewing costs, and preparing invoices. He charged me £42 for my two-sentence email to him confirming I paid their bill which took him 6 minutes to read. He also billed four separate times for the “bill preparation” itself.

Do you think that is normal for a solicitor service? What can I do?

There will be a minimum period of account for any chargeable activity, in this case it seems to be one tenth of an hour. That is quite normal and no doubt set out somewhere in their terms and conditions.

Whether or not that particular item should be chargeable is a another matter.

It is (was?) possible to ask for a free remuneration certificate from the Law Society to access whether or not a solicitor's bill is fair and reasonable.

It is many years since I have had any direct chargeable dealings with solicitors so I may be well out of date. You could contact the Law Society for further advice.

TELLIT01

It's over 10 years since I had to deal with a solicitor but at least that one advised me to wait for them to contact me regarding progress with Probate.  He explained that every time a message was received from a client requesting information there was a cost involved and they could ramp up very easily.

A refreshing attitude from a profession not known for underselling themselves.

MyRealNameToo

Anikats said:

Abbafan1972 said:

Anikats said:

Thank you @MeteredOut - no I have not tried anything yet. I paid his bills and stopped using his services. I know that solicitors services are expensive - but it feels so wrong to pay £2,215.50+VAT for almost nothing

You won’t be able do anything then, if you paid the bills without contesting them. 

Oh, okay, so it looks it is my mistake to be so naive.....
In my correspondence to the solicitor I mentioned that the bill is too much and asked for explanation - and then I was sent the itemised spreadsheet. Can something be done? 

Anikats said:

Thank you MeteredOut - no I have not tried anything yet. I paid his bills and stopped using his services. I know that solicitors services are expensive - but it feels so wrong to pay £2,215.50+VAT for almost nothing

There was a story in the press a while back of a woman who was exchanging emails about her Xmas plans in a chatty/informal way and was then shocked to find the bill came with each of those emails received and replied to charged as 6 minutes/£75

First of all check the spreadsheet to make sure you think it's correct. 6 minutes is almost a default for dealing with a short email/telephone call and reply. 


The solicitor should also have provided a warning if you were going to overrun the estimate with an explanation, though that email itself will have come with a bill. 

scoobyjones1

some solicitors are barely legal fraudsters, IMO.
Avoid using one wherever possible and if you really have to, ask for a list of all of their charges, in detail, in advance. They charge you for every letter, email, phone call, office visit, home visit and there is no way of knowing exactly how much "work" they do as it's their word against yours....and they charge by the word!

Anikats

The solicitor should also have provided a warning if you were going to overrun the estimate with an explanation, though that email itself will have come with a bill. 

No warning - at the end he sent an email asking for additional £700+VAT if I want to get his legal advice. At that point I just said that I don't need his services anymore. I was charged even for his emails notifying me that he is going for holiday(3 times he went holidays for that period)

MeteredOut

Anikats said:

The solicitor should also have provided a warning if you were going to overrun the estimate with an explanation, though that email itself will have come with a bill. 

No warning - at the end he sent an email asking for additional £700+VAT if I want to get his legal advice. At that point I just said that I don't need his services anymore. I was charged even for his emails notifying me that he is going for holiday(3 times he went holidays for that period)

I would 100% challenge that, though as stated above, its more difficult now that you've paid them.

But, it could be a clerical error. My solicitor (who charges very fairly) does not do his own billing, but passes it onto his admin team to do. It could be they've been over zealous. I'd certainly be asking.