To refuse to write legal letters for DH as he's too tight to pay a solicitor?

[Momentumista]

Dh has been having letters from his ex-wife’s solicitor relating to the payments he’s making her. He has expected me to respond to these letters. I have no legal training and they advised him to get his own legal advice. He then consulted a parent of DS friend who is a solicitor. He agreed to help draft a response, and DH gave me to understand said parent had agreed to help him for free – I was sceptical as I wondered what he (the parent ) was getting form it, but accepted what DH said on face value. I duly wrote a letter based on scribbled notes DH received from this solicitor parent.

When I bumped into said parent I thanked him for helping and he looked surprised and said – oh no, I’m not taking on free advice & assistance, I just said I will have a look at the letter (and any reply DH gets) and advise him if he has a case.

Massive shock for me as I realise DH is up to his old tricks of (a) conning me and (b) expecting something for nothing – I.e. Refusing to pay for proper legal advice. I talked to DH and said I don not want to be responsible for writing his letters.

He promised me he would get an appt with a solicitor and hand the whole thing over to them to take the stress and worry away from me. He duly told me he had an appt. However….. This turned out to be a free family law surgery organised by his union, and he has now come back to me saying that I need to write a letter for him based on what they told him at this free clinic. He claimed they said it would cost £500 if they wrote the letter.

I was so angry. I re-iterated he needs to get his own legal advice and I can’t be writing letters for him. He has money he could use for this, why not use it, or at least give me something for writing the letters (this will be the 3rd I have written for him based on cheap scribbled notes). He then had the cheek to tell me that I was going to New York in January – as if it was some kind of treat he had paid for – when in fact I am funding myself from my savings.

I feel so frustrated he is trying to do the whole thing 'on the cheap', using me and my writing skills - although I know nothing about the subject matter or his legal rights and I have repeatedly told him I don’t want to do it.

I am at a loss as to how to proceed. He is completely inarticulate and unable to convey information on his own in written form.

If I leave him to muddle his own way through it will be a car crash, and potentially impact our family finances if his ex wife gets more than she might if he got proper advice. On the other hand I really don’t want to get involved as writing these letters causes he huge stress and anxiety.

Sorry for long post.

WWYD?

I don't think it's fair for him to be pressurising you to write the letters. Is the ex asking for more money? Presume the divorce is finalised so what if she doing instigating new communication?

The problem is the one you highlighted in your OP. He has been conning you.
And I dint think he is gullible when he is asking the friend's father for advice. He is trying to conn him the same way that he is conning you.

He doesnt sound like the sort of person I want to be with tbh. How can you ever trust him?

Cheap with his ex wife - sounds like he's trying to reduce payments or settlement,

and cheap when it comes to legal advice - expecting you and this parent to do it for him for free.

Take note. The ex could be you at some point.

Don't get stressed about it. Just say you can't do it. You are not a lawyer and neither is he. If it is just typing up notes, he can do it. I assume he's not illiterate?

You honestly want to know what people would do, if so

I would let him go ahead and do it himself. He is a grown up

He has been told he should get proper legal advice
He has been told the matter is important
He has been told you are not qualified

You know his ex wife is more than likely the sensible one for getting out of a relationship with him and so far you have said nothing that would indicate she has done him harm.

This is his issue and his problem and his responsibility

So just say "no this is not happening you need to either do it yourself or pay a professional to do it" and allow your actions to confirm this and do not discuss it any further.

Then stand back at watch him either grow the fuck up or fall.

I'm guessing the ex has actually got a really good case, I'll bet he's trying to shaft her financially.

Anyone betting he's stopped making payments?

I have to say I agree with Spottheduck. There is nothing unusual about the more literate partner in a relationship helping out the other one by writing a letter. And it also does not matter that you are not legally qualified - he's not asking you to write a letter on headed notepaper purporting to be a solicitor, he is asking you to write a letter which (presumably) is signed by him, i.e. as someone who is self-representing, based on the patchy/sketchy legal advice he's been able to obtain free of charge.

BUT if you're not in a equal partnership/you don't love him then I can see that you wouldn't want to do this and he's wrong to lie to you or force you to do it.

But in a normal partnership, what he has asked you to do is par for the course.

Refuse - point out that the Law is very complex and new legislation is coming out all of the time. A comma in the wrong place could cost him a fortune - and as a non-lawyer your attempts at writing a letter could cost him several fortunes.

If he's so confident this can be done from a few notes scribbled on the back of an envelope (so to speak) why does he not do it himself? He has at least had the chance t talk to this lawyer friend and ask for clarification if necessary.

And it is unfair to ask anyone for a freebie if that is how they make their living. Lawyer friend won't be able to communicate with ex's lawyer and thrash out details, and certainly won't spend his valuable time searching all the why's and wherefore's to get him the best deal, because that his time-consuming and he isn't being paid for it.

Your DH is an idiot. That £500 could be the best money he's every spent.

Just say no and stop doing it.

Then either he'll need to pay for it, like everyone else.

Or he can write them himself and take his fate.

Your relationship sounds very, very troubling to me.

I agree with origami and others that in normal circumstances helping to write a letter when your partner is not gifted with words is a kind and sensible thing to do.

I think if he were sitting next to her saying "right, and so next I need to point out that I've been sending £50 a week for three years" and she types "In accordance with our original agreement I have been sending £50 a week since 4 December 2013 by standing order from my bank account to yours" then that's helping. But that isn't what he's asking for.

Putting bullshit into flowery language won't actually help him. But that's what he's asking for, so OP is quite within her rights and very sensible to put her foot down and say it won't do.

OP, I do hope you can find a way out of this unhappy relationship. Nobody is truly trapped, although sometimes the escape route is very narrow and very difficult to see.

Has he got any good points?

origamiwarrior she is clearly uncomfortable with writing these letters and she is concerned that what she is writing in these letters could be detrimental to her ex's case. There's no way I would write a letter for my DH in response to a solicitor. It's not because I don't love him, it's because I wouldn't want to inadvertently create more problems for him. It's completely reasonable to involve a solicitor in response to a letter from a solicitor (solicitors should be communicating with each other on behalf of their clients anyway).

As an ex-lawyer - these kinds of things are not just about writing coherent sentences of fact and chucking a few "heretofore"s in for good measure (as you know). The fact that you can write well won't help him. You need to refuse, for his sake. And who will he come crying to if the letter you write doesn't achieve the result he wants?

As others have pointed out, though, there's a bigger issue here re your relationship, and I hope you can do what's best for you in the future.

Personally it depends on the types of letters, but as you and others have stated these are letters where he needs legal help.

This thread screams out that you aren't happy and don't trust him on quite a few levels.

I'd be thinking about my future with him and thinking his ex wife did have w point in getting divorced yes when working a legal sec didn't see it a lot but occasionally had a car crash relationship usually a man who'd been divorced, got into a new relationship, had kids, had to pay maintenance but thought it was a lot etc these types are generally a car crash as you can see right through them and not wanting to pay more but you know they're either being tight or have money! This one client (latter) I often saw him at a station in SW London (a leafy, affluent part) in a smart suit, so he certainly wasn't poor.

What EssentialHummus and everyone else says.

sorry OP.

I was once married to amd in love with a psychopathic chap who wouldn't know honestly and decemt behaviour if it punched him in the face.

prior to the above bit of Information being brought to my attention I wanted to help him.

No way would I have agreed to help him write a legal letter unless I believed that the content of that letter was fair reasonable and would not disadvantage his ex wife unfairly or any children.

LTB

I think the letters are the least of your problems. It does not sound like a mutually satisfactory relationship. You write as if you don't like him very much and you have no respect for his behaviour or his choices. You are worried about the long term financial implications of staying with him.

You say you ended up with him 'against your better judgement'. If you think you made a mistake entering into this marriage, perhaps you need to correct that sooner rather than later?

Showmepotato - you've hit the nail on the head. I just want him to employ a solicitor so that his solicitor can correspond with his ex's solicitor (like any normal person surely). I feel it's unfair to expect me to write (on his behalf) to his ex wife's solicitor.

Sorry, I must be a bit dense :
I don't understand why is is asking you to write these letters in the first place.
You say you have no legal training, the dispute is with HIS ex-wife (not your ex-H if you have one) and just because you 'write well' is no reason at all why you should have anything to do with this.

"No" is a complete sentence.
Whether he then goes and writes his own letter or gets a solicitor to do it (and pays him to do it!) is up to him.

You cannot control his behaviour, but you can control your response to it.
I am baffled.

This sounds bizarre
Like a forced marriage?
Anyway you are not his secretary. Refuse to do it. I'm guessing his ex is his ex for very good reasons.

But in a normal relationship don't people write their own letters? . Puzzled by some replies.

Pacific - he is asking because he is too mean to pay for proper legal advice.

He is trying to persuade me into doing it to 'save supposedly our his money'.

He won't accept 'no' - i don't know what part of no he doesn't understand, but he doesn't.

You need to deploy the broken record technique.
With an even voice keep repeating the same thing:
"No."
"I won't be writing your letter"
"The letter won't be written by me"
"You need to make other arrangements for that letter"
"I have no role to play in this dispute"
"No".

Why a grown adult would not write their own letters if they are too tight to employ a professional to do it, I'll never understand....

OP that's not the answer really
He'll save money if he does it himself.
He has a view on what wives are for, I'm guessing!