to be fuming at the charges MIL has received from Solicitors

[mythical]

My MIL is trying to get a divorce, she went for an initial meeting with a local solicitor (it was booked over the phone - she specifically requested a certain solicitor on the list that was around £135 per hour.
She had a meeting of 1.24 hours(just to discuss where she stands at the moment), to actually get this meeting she was asked to pay £500 upfront for any costs and she agreed.
Since then they have sent out 2 letters to her (one which was just a summary of what they discussed at the interview and one about their terms and conditions)
They have just sent a letter yesterday telling her that she now owes them £300 ON TOP of the £500 she's already paid!!!!! for a 1.24 hr interview and 2 letters.
She was charged at a rate of £175 per hour.

they have sent her a letter with the "breakdown" of the costs and they have even charged her £17.5 for her ringing to make an appointment!(that they then cancelled) and things like £17.5 for "preparing" the terms and conditions letter and another £17.5 for sending it, this is just mad! she was not told she would be charged at this rate before she went in. She is very upset about this.

AIBU to think what they charged is absolutely outrageous?? £800 for a 1.24hr meeting and a few letter sent out?!

Sorry if a lot doesn't make sense i'm quite upset about this too

I don't have a lot of experience with solicitors, but that does sound like quite a lot given the specific breakdown!

they have also charged (twice, £50 each time) for "perusal" of her file at some random dates!!

if i wasn't happy with my solicitor i would use another one. Can your MIL use another one?

it's not about using another solicitor, it's about having to pay £800 for what they've done so far. which is nearly nothing, she could have got the same information by using a "free 1h consultation" thingy

I don't know if it's standard practice in the UK but charging for making appointments and 'preparing' terms and conditions just seems ridiculous to me especially when you know that it's pro forma/ basic stuff that a secretary does for about 25K a year.

Perhaps she should contact The Law Society to see if they're allowed to charge for all these items - and given she requested (and saw?) the 135ph solicitor she should dispute the 175ph charge.

Sounds right ime. Sending letters etc is usually very very expensive. Challenge them and see what they say.

Maybe she needs to clarify the charge per hour for the solicitor she requested. Sometimes more senior or experienced solicitors go at a higher rate, maybe the £135 was a quote for the junior one. Could she/did she not shop around?

Most solicitors do time-recording so looking at a file is a cost to be billed to either the client or Legal Aid

She asked for the £135 solicitor when she made the appointment, they did not tell her the solicitor she actually had the appointment with was more expensive! they just sort of went "ah x is not here today - this lady will help you instead" on the day! I understand them charging to look at the details if they're actually going to do something related to the case but they didn't? they just .. "perused" the documents.

The Terms and Conditions will be a pre-prepared precedent that already exists and they'll have personalised with a few of her details. That'll have take a secretary all of 5 minutes !!! (Am ex-legal secretary).

Tell her to challenge the fees and to inform them that she'll be speaking to the Solicitors Regulation authority straight away.

Did the letters include any advice? I would expect to have to pay for advice, and preparing it, but not for standard T&C's letters.

Mini in fairness it depends on the sort of work we're talking about. I used to do my own client care letters, admittedly based on a pro-forma, but the contractual bit would vary a lot from client to client, because the work was quite bespoke - and the scope of services had to be very clearly defined. The letters generally took me about an hour to write, but it could be more.

It's going to come down to what was said during the booking process, what was said about costs at the meeting and what it says in the terms and conditions if she has either signed them, or continued with the instruction after receiving them.

It's always hard to get money back after you've passed it over, but she shouldn't pay anything else until this is cleared up. She should use the complaints procedure set out in the client care letter and ask for a remuneration certificate if she's not satisfied.

right i have found the letter they have charged her £100 for - it's a one page letter about what they discussed at the interview.

In the breakdown of costs all these letters and charges add up to £525 - they have then added another £105 VAT on top of that - it says total balance due £138 (as she had £500 on the account)
In the actual letter it says the total amount is £792 - that they have discharged the £500 she already had on the account - and that there is £292 left to pay. where did they get this from?!

OP have a look in the client care letter there should be a section setting out in detail what they have agreed to do and what the service doesn't include, and then there should be a section which explains what it will all cost and how that will break down. In the ts and cs it will give further details such as whether they charge for photocopying, document storage and postage.

£100 is cheap for a legal letter, but they can only charge if there was a clear agreement (an oral agreement at the meeting would do) that they would write a letter and would charge for it. I'd then expect to see a mention of the advice letter in the client care letter.

She should have been told what the cost of the meeting would be as well. Solicitors are very highly regulated and there are strict rules about managing clients' expectations. If you complain they will very likely back down ime.

She should complain to the firm and if she is not satisfied, she can refer the matter to the Legal Ombudsman (which is free to complainants but costs the firm about £400!).

i have a bit of experience in instructing solicitors, and I wouldn't expect to be charged solicitors' time for making and cancelling an appointment or a client care letter, which is setting out the T and C on which your MIL can then decide whether or not to instruct them.

otherwise, review the client care letter carefully to see what they indicate they will be charging you for. in particular, ask them to advise what the "perusal" charges relate to. explain that you want to understand why this work was done as it does not appear to have been done at your request as the client.

challenge the headline rate, as it does not match the list.

finally, make it clear that if this isn't done, then you will be talking to the SRA. I think these charges are high assuming the work was done by a high street firm.

Phone calls to arrange appointments should be time recorded as admin and not billed for, provided that's all that happened during the phone call. It's only legitimate to bill for them if any advice was given too eg if your MIL asked how long the divorce process was likely to take.

There's nothing controversial about charging VAT, unless they told MIL the fee she paid would include it. So I wouldn't mention that one unless and until you've checked the terms and conditions letter. The fact that some solicitors would have done some of this in a free first hour of advice (and frankly, they wouldn't have done all of it) is neither here nor there either.

Lastly, I'm legal aid and haven't done much private work, but it's taking the piss to charge twice for doing the same letter. Which it sounds like they're doing by billing to prepare and send the terms and conditions letter. You pick one or the other.

So yeah, certainly a few things that she should query!

Watching the voice now but promise to get back to you on this with some proper legal advice from DH lawyer who has a way for you to recoup these illegal"double charges"

Solicitors are expensive and commonly charge in 6 min units. However MIL should Definitely complain especially re the hike in hourly rate. Yanbu! First through complaints procedure

I am a solicitor and I think this is above what your MIL should expect. First off, she should have been made aware of the hourly rate of the solicitor advising her beforehand. they should also give her a proper cost estimate up front for the various stages of the work. As a rule, I wouldn't have charged for the T&Cs letter, I would probably have charged for the letter recording what was discussed at the meeting b/c it is often important for a client to have a proper written record of advice. Again tho, I would have told your MIL that i was going to write the letter, and explained why.

there are pretty strict rules for solicitors in terms of giving proper info on costs. in my experience, the only problems that do arise in relation to costs are where a client is taken by surprise. if you have done your job properly and given decent estimates and updates, there should be no surprises. And I do complex business to business litigation, where it is sometimes really hard to do this, but I manage. So i'm pretty sure your MIL's divorce lawyer could have done so.

on your mil's charges, at the most, i'd prob charge for the meeting and prob a max of 1 hr for the letter recording the advice. in relation to the hourly charge, they will probably argue (perhaps rightly) that the more senior lawyer at £175/hr will do things quicker than the more junior one at £135/hr. they should have told her beforehand tho.

and lastly, altho this particular firm seems to have ballsed up here, legal advice is pricey, but clients shouldn't expect something for nothing. (not saying your mil is).

You have had brilliant advice on hereso probably nothing new to add. DH said that the solicitor should have explained all the charges/ costs of letters etc before proceeding with the meeting with your MIL. If she was happy and agreed the costs only then should the meeting have carried on. The charge for the letter sounds about right but not the double charge of sending it. The £17.50 for preparing the contract sounds wrong as this is just a standard contract that the firm print off and use for all their clients it does not need to be "prepared". On the back of the bill there should be a notice explaining the complaints procedure should you disagree with the charges. You have a set number of days to query the bill with the law society. Tell the firm in question that you are doing this and tell the Law society that you were unaware that these would be the charges.
HTH.

Thank you so much for all the replies, i haven't updated yet as need to talk to MIL about t&c letter, read exactly what it says and contact the solicitors, i agree 100% no one should expect anything for nothing but it just seems to me everything has been so poorly explained to her and there is no explanation of how they got to the final sum!
As a quick reply to fuckwittery on the letter it clearly says - your total amount from x date to x date is £792. We have deducted the £500 you had on account - outstanding amount is £292