Legal Services Act

AIM-listed National Accident Helpline plc (NAH) saw income rise by just over 10% in 2014 on the back of a significant increase in enquiries, it reported yesterday.

Jim Sutcliffe, appointed deputy chairman of alternative business structure Quindell earlier this month, has resigned from the board of the Financial Reporting Council.

A debt collection business has become an alternative business structure (ABS) and can now offer an end-to-end service that enables it to collect, litigate and enforce clients’ debt.

A new lawyer-matching service aimed particularly at tech start-ups has secured £260,000 of funding from e-commerce funder Forward Partners and Jonathan McKay, chairman of JustGiving.

A new firm formed by some of the country’s best-known private client lawyers is promising to provide high net-worth clients with a service provided only by “exceptionally knowledgeable” senior lawyers.

Quindell was the centre of renewed criticism this week over the grant of over 8m in share options to Richard Rose, the AIM-listed company’s new non-executive chairman, whose appointment was announced on Monday.

The British Printing Industries Federation is aiming to meet the unmet need for legal advice in the sector, having finally revealed its plans for the alternative business structure licenced by the SRA some seven months ago.

Alternative business structure Quindell plc was finally on the up last week, with its share price soaring 58% in four days. And they were up a further 30% in early trading today after heavyweight figures were appointed to the board.

DBS Law, a fast-growing general civil practice based in Birmingham, has become an alternative business structure as it looks to build on its dramatic growth over recent years.

US online legal services provider LegalZoom – which claims to be the best-known legal brand in America – has today become the first US business to be licensed as an alternative business structure.

The chief executive of Quindell plc’s legal services division has left the company, it has emerged. The news comes in the wake of the ABS’s announcement that it is in talks to sell one of its operating divisions to generate cash.

Law firms should issue two separate retainers to clients where they are provided with consumer credit as well as purely legal services, the Legal Ombudsman has suggested.

David Hassall, a senior partner turned barrister whose career mirrors recent changes in legal services, has set up an alternative business structure – which he intends to operate on a ‘John Lewis’ profit share model.

Failure to undertake continuous professional development will be an “aggravating factor” when enforcement decisions are made against those guilty of incompetence, the Solicitors Regulation Authority has said.

There is scope for the Legal Ombudsman (LeO) to offer redress to third parties, as long as the complaints involved could be “clearly and tightly defined”, a report by a LeO working party has found.