Solicitor Invoices

[teram]

Do solicitors have to provide an itemised invoice?

[Celestine]

You should take a careful look at the client care letter supplied by your solicitor to see what they agreed about costs and keeping you informed.

For non court matters, solicitors are only required to provide you with a summary bill. You can ask your solicitor for a more detailed breakdown but they don't have to provide one.
For court matters (contentious) they can also supply a summary bill. You can ask for a detailed bill but you must request it within 3 months of the summary bill.

[teram]

Can you advise me of what 'Attendance' covers on a Solicitors bill please
l had no communication with them on the dates mentioned.

[R0b]

An attendance is a note of something which the solicitor records. That could be a telephone call, meeting, court attendance, review of your file or documents received etc.

It doesnt necessarily mean a telephone call with you

[teram]

The bill states: 1 letter, 1 unit, which was an email l sent them asking a couple of questions. One letter out-1 unit, was their reply. Next was Preparation of non routine letter to client 2 units, dated the same as their reply letter. And, dated one week later Attendance,: other side - 3 units, client 5 units.* I have neither sent or received anything since their original reply. Are they double charging me? Bill totalled over £300.

[R0b]

The bill states: 1 letter, 1 unit, which was an email l sent them asking a couple of questions. One letter out-1 unit, was their reply. Next was Preparation of non routine letter to client 2 units, dated the same as their reply letter. And, dated one week later Attendance,: other side - 3 units, client 5 units. I have neither sent or received anything since their original reply. Are they double charging me? Bill totalled over £300.

Again, I suggest you re-read what I said in the last post. If you are really not sure what it is for, the simplest thing to do is give them a call and ask - you are entitled to know how the charges add up.

[teram]

I did read your reply several times, but to be honest l thought l would outline my concern to make it clearer as l am unsure what the Attendance part referred to and whether it was the norm. I was hoping it would make sense to you and you could advise. I will however, as you state, contact them which undoubtedly will result in yet another bill. Thank you anyway.

[R0b]

Attendance,: other side - 3 units, client 5 units

It would suggest your solicitor has spoken to the other side and then perhaps reviewed your file or prepared a note of the discussion? Solicitors bill in 6 minute units so it would appear your solicitor has been in contact with the other side and then a note on your account following that possibly describing the call.

That's just a guess so you should just ask for a breakdown of what this covered.

[teram]

The Solicitor was asked for a breakdown but did not respond. Then a letter arrived asking for more money. It stated that money for the Barrister had to be paid by 4pm that day or she would be reallocated to another client. The money for the Barrister had already been paid in over 1 month ago so as you can imagine, this came across as a totally disrespectful letter. On contact with the Solicitor, regarding this letter, (having still not received any response to the breakdown request) one of the attendance' charges were said to be for a phone call advising of the Court proceeding being done by open video, because of the Corona virus, for which the charge was 5 units for a 20 minute 12 second call. Is this the norm?

[R0b]

If they aren't engaging with you about the breakdown of cost then you should be looking at making a formal complaint which should be set out in the initial welcome pack when you first instructed them or alternatively, it should be on their website. If they still don't engage or you still haven't received a satisfactory response then you can look at going to the Legal Ombudsman for a decision.

As for the charge, I don't know what you mean by 'is this the norm?'. Yes it is normal for dispute resolution solicitors to call the court if that's what you're asking. However, 5 units charged at 6 minute blocks is not correct, that should be 4 units (6x4 = 24 mins). The only way they would charge 5 units is if they are charging in blocks of 5 minutes and that would be unusual. Most solicitors charge blocks of 6 minutes especially for litigation work and anything different would be uncommon. Again, check the terms and conditions on how their work is charged.

Food for thought: Is it reasonable for your solicitor to call the court at a very busy period and (presumably) sit in a queue just to inform them that proceedings could be done by video when instead a routine email could have sufficed and only have charged 1 unit instead of 5? Not suggesting it is unreasonable but something you may want to query.

[teram]

They do charge per 6 minutes and the extra time was queried after their explanation as well but again, still no answer from them. The charged call was to discuss with us of the possibility and probabilities of the Court hearing being a video hearing, it wasn't a call to the court.
Would complaining affect the case?

[Marychif]

They must take into consideration every step they take. I am sure that somebody who works in a field related to the law must be careful and answer every decision they take and answer every question; this is why they must provide an itemized invoice. It is more for their safety than a legal procedure. If you don't believe me, you could ask the experts from https://swpdxlaw.com to explain everything. Honestly, it would have been better if everybody had written down any of their actions. Only like that would a company be able to find out what mistakes their workers made and understand how careful they are when it comes to their work process.