Consent orders, solicitors costs

[Mackers123]

Hi all, I just rang a solicitor to get an idea of what it involved and costs. They don't give info over the phone and insist that you come in for an hours chat at a fixed rate of £120. Is this normal?

The costs depend on so much have you got loads of assets, is the divorce likely to be very adversarial and are their complex child contact matters.
My cost estimates were £5K when it seems nice and straight forward. Then 20K when their were complex child contact issues. Ended up being 11k as ExH didn't take child contact to court as he didn't have a leg to stand on when his SD was taken into care.

Do you mean just to draw up a financial consent order? I was expecting this to be in the region of £250 but then ours is fairly straight forward (50/50 house split), no pension sharing and we are not likely to argue about anything.

Some solicitors will offer you a free half an hour initial chat. Shop around. But yes once it progresses that sounds about right - depending on the solicitor. Some deal with high net worth and are triple that!

yes I meant to draw up the consent order. Mine is fairly straight forward just 50/50 on everything. I really don't think I need to have a meeting at the cost of £120 then pay on top for the order. I will see if any local solicitors offer the free half hour.

To OP

£120 per hour is reasonable in today's market.

The free half hour is more likely to be general advice as opposed to reviewing consent orders that you and ex have drafted/agreed upon.

Talking to a colleague today he said he thought it would be more in the £700-750 mark for a consent order. I was surprised it would be this much to be honest

Our consent order cost less than £200. Lots of solicitors have a fixed fee for this.

Our consent order cost less than £200

That's cheap.

Some solicitors will charge you a small fee just to put the agreement you have reached into legal language. But you will not be getting any advice on whether the deal you have reached is a good one. A face to face meeting is a good idea just to discuss your finances generally and to make sure that you aren't being taken for a ride by your spouse.

Yes, maybe that's why ours was cheap. We had everything worked out - neither of us needed any legal advice, literally just writing up what we had agreed. They did ask questions about what we had proposed etc.