help please ditched by sol 6 weeks before final hearing

[noteabagsintoilet]

help please - posted here before - had a showdown with solicitor today upshot is she's ceasing to act for me - already under immense stress - referred myself back to psychiatric team at the weekend due to long term depression as feel im at breaking point - have had doubts about both my solicitor and barrister - today solicitor refused to take an instruction I feel because the answer willl implicate them as well as my x -the lengths my x has been going to manipulate our case. I have questions re fees that have not been answered and due to this my bill not paid up to date - what the fuck can i do - my final hearing was already adjourned due to my depression . my narcisstic x has done what i feared made me out to be the loose cannon. Please help before i tip over the edge

is it normal practice for solicitors to charge in time blocks ie 30 minutes - so if they spend 5 minutes on an email you still get charged 30 minutes time - also my original solicitor left and a new one took over - i cant remember if i signed terms of business - but should i have signed a new one for new solicitor or is it per firm - i am in a dire situation currently - any advice greatly appreciated

Highly unlikely the minimum charging time is 30 mins - usually they are counted in units of 6 mins, but some firms (like mine) charge in units of 1 minute.

If your relationship with them has broken down to the extent that you have no trust in them, and they no trust in you, it is perhaps for the best that they stop acting. Their terms of business will stipulate that they can stop acting if you do not pay a bill.

You need to ring around and get someone else to represent you urgently. There's still time. If you feel you've been badly treated by your solicitors the first step is to put your concerns in writing and make a formal complaint, but focus your energies for now on finding someone else.

As above - solictors usually charge in 6 minute blocks. On your bills or your initial terms of engagement letter there will be details how you can query a bill. However if you are refusing to pay then a solicitor will usually have in their terms they csn refuse to act it hand over the file to new solicitors until they are paid. It does sound as if your relationship has broken down and I would not want to act if a client implied that I had colluded with the other side or behaved inappropriately. Unfortunately many clients who find the case is not going how they would like it to are quick to blame their lawyers. Also many will not want to take on a new client without payment upfront if they know the client is refusing to pay the previous firm.

It may be that the emsil took 5 minutes to type but there would have been time thinking about what needed to be said and aldo possibly reading documents to formulate the answer

6 minutes much more likely that 30 mins.

You don't need a new set of terms for a new solicitor but you do need to be told the new person's chargeout rate. That could be by email or letter.

Can you be more specific about your other concerns?

apologies got this wrong yes its 6 min charging

im not sure if i had terms of business have asked for a copy - my bill is mostly uptodate - have been querying for sometime and sol is only now responding - they also hold funds from house sale so have "security". Been charged for "file management" several times but not all issues been addressed - not suggesting they have colluded with otherside home and its not that case is not going how I would like it -just come to loggerheads over one issue and I can no longer ignore my other concerns more they have missed things and there have been several unexplained "IT" issues. Have secured new solicitor just waiting on old one to sort bill.

"File management" is a legitimate chargeable category I'm afraid. I don't use that description but there's nothing to say they can't.

i dont doubt it is a legitimate charge but my concern is that i have been charged for it when nothing appears to have been done from one file management to another except where I have raised issues

But how would you know what file management had been done?

I think you might be focussing on the wrong thing when you're so close to the hearing. Have you got anywhere with finding someone new?

Sorry just read you have. That's great. Hope it's a more successful relationship and you feel that they're working hard for you