paralegals writing letters as if they are a solicitor

[byebluey]

As title, paralegals writing letters and emails as if they are a solicitor, signing off in their own name with paralegal at end of letter/ email. Using "I" and "me" followed by solicitors name in brackets in body of letter, and stating at the start as a heading "Sent on behalf of solicitor (name given"

The solicitor is also copied into the email.

Is this allowed and counted as supervision?

It will have been supervised or else the paralegal is trusted to do it. Paralegals can have varying levels of experience.

I’m a solicitor, my paralegal does this if she sends things on my behalf, i.e. I will tell her shorthand what to say and she will type it out into a proper letter/email. This is very common. I don’t know another solicitor who doesn’t do this.

if it’s clear on its face that it’s from a paralegal supervised by a qualified solicitor, which your example suggests it is, then it’s fine.

I fired my paralegal when I was getting divorced & insisted on a solicitor, I just didn't have any confidence in her.

Did you instruct just a paralegal to begin with? Or did you instruct a solicitor but didn’t want the paralegal to work on your file?

Almost all my emails come from my Solicitor's secretary, all written in the 1st person and I know they're not coming from the secretary.

There are strict rules about the supervision of non-lawyers doing legal work, and the paralegal not passing themselves off as a solicitor. But the is one clearly isn’t as you are aware the person is a paralegal.

As to whether you want a paralegal doing the work, that depends on the context and the experience of the paralegal. Someone who has been a paralegal for six months while they try to get a training contract handling something complex - no. Someone who is a career paralegal who has done 50 cases like your before - you are probably better off with that person than a two year qualified solicitor.

Hmm I don’t know. I often find paralegals who are trying to qualify to be a little more proactive and interested in learning/improving. That’s not a slight to career paralegals who are also excellent, but can often be set in their ways.

I was on legal aid & just got given a paralegal, she was to sympathetic towards my ex husband & I didn't feel supported.

Would you rather AI write them?

From a barrister’s point of view this is all a bit unsatisfactory. I cannot delegate documents to someone else: I can ask a pupil to draft, I can ask a junior to devil, but I read what they draft, I have my name on it when it becomes a final document and I take ultimate responsibility for it.

Solicitors really should be at least reading every letter and signing it. I’m not talking about Mazur and the strict legal position on supervised unqualified staff; I’m talking about the sensible, expected - by clients - position that solicitors are actually aware of and running every aspect and detail of their case.

It’s a bit shocking that the economics of solicitors’ firms now rests so much on badly paid unqualified staff conducting cases.

As long as the solicitor is copied in and aware then it's ok.