Legal Services Act

An innovative Cardiff law firm has secured an alternative business structure (ABS) licence as it looks to private equity to expand what it offers the mergers and acquisitions market beyond legal services, with its corporate financier chairman also becoming a shareholder.

The country’s biggest conveyancing business, My Home Move, has consolidated its position by acquiring Advantage Property Lawyers, the sixth biggest conveyancer and a significant player in the north-east of England in particular. My Home Move will soon be pass the 100,000 completions a year mark as a result.

A second alternative business structure license handed to a FTSE-250 wealth management company has highlighted a law firm acquisition three years ago that went virtually unnoticed. It was given to Rathbone Trust Legal Services, part of Rathbone Brothers plc, a City institution with origins dating to 1742.

Co-operative Legal Services recorded a 22% jump in turnover in 2016 and tripled its profit as it continues to recover from the difficulties it experienced in previous years. The legal services operation is also to be brought together with the Co-op’s funerals business to create a Life Planning division.

The former boss of the first accident management company to buy a law firm and become an alternative business structure has been rebuked and fined £7,500 by the Solicitors Regulation Authority for 11 accounts rule breaches and two breaches of the SRA principles.

The Bar Standards Board has today begun licensing alternative business structures (ABSs), making it the fifth body granted the power. As with its regime for lawyer-only owned entities, it will specialise in ‘advocacy focused’ ABSs.

A Bar Standards Board-regulated entity has acquired more than 800 clients in less than 18 months, which it claims makes it the largest in the country, by capitalising on barristers’ relatively new right to conduct litigation. It also said that having the involvement of barristers from the start of a case speeds them up.

Consumers are gradually getting more comfortable with the idea of seeking legal advice from banks and insurance companies but enthusiasm remains muted, new research has found. YouGov also showed that two major law firms are succeeding in building a consumer brand.

The incoming chair of the Office for Legal Complaints – the body that oversees the Legal Ombudsman – is to sell her investments in two leading alternative business structures, it has been confirmed. The fact Wanda Goldwag had them only came into the public domain last Friday.

A record number of start-ups targeting the legal market received funding around the world last year, new research has found. It comes as City giant Allen & Overy is to nurture legal tech start-ups with the creation of an incubator.