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A six-month private test of the government’s new online probate service started last month, it has emerged as it looks to digitise the 280,000 applications received each year. As part of the project, HM Courts & Tribunals Service is working to better understand solicitors’ needs to reduce the number of applications that have to be returned.

The government is to impose fixed recoverable costs for holiday sickness cases as war is breaking out over letters that a leading holiday operator is sending directly to claimants even if they already have solicitors. However, Jet2holidays has told Legal Futures that the letters have generated responses from holiday makers unaware that a claim had been made on their behalf.

A poll of almost 1,500 mortgage customers has highlighted familiar concerns about conveyancing – that it is slow, stressful and poor value for money. Conveyancers also came bottom when judged by how much they ‘made the deal happen’ compared to others in the process.

A hackathon has led to the creation by lawyers and technologies of a free mobile app aimed at helping the victims of the Grenfell Tower fire tragedy access support services and information. Legal Hackers Scotland, assisted by Glasgow tech firm Add Jam, put the app together in seven days following the hackathon.

A partner who left London law firm Winckworth Sherwood after harassing female colleagues at its Christmas party last year has been rebuked by the Solicitors Regulation Authority. John Burnand, “whilst intoxicated, behaved in an inappropriate, physical manner towards several female members of the firm’s staff”.

No further public money should be spent on the Online Court until the performance of the newly-expanded online tribunal in British Columbia – which went live for small claims last month – has been assessed, according to veteran justice campaigner Professor Roger Smith.

A man who posed as a barrister to con his victims out of thousands of pounds has been jailed for two years. Leonard Ogilvy, 51, of south London was found guilty at Southwark Crown Court of three counts of wilfully pretending to be a barrister and three counts of fraud by false representation.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority has warned solicitors that professional negligence claims based on unbundled services have fuelled a “rapidly developing area of case law”. The regulator also revealed that it has already allowed a solicitor to practise from an unregulated business, a reform that has attracted stinging criticism.

Other jurisdictions are spreading lies that Brexit will reduce the quality and standing of England’s law and courts, the Lord Chief Justice, Lord Judge, has claimed as he urged the government to get on with tackling how cross-border civil law issues will work after the UK leaves the EU.

The co-founder of a law firm who received a police caution after punching a female colleague in the face has been rebuked by the Solicitors Regulation Authority. The regulator has also rebuked a partner at a leading regional law firm for breaching client confidentiality.