Legal Services Act

Nearly half of large law firms are planning to become alternative business structures (ABSs), Investec Specialist Private Bank has reported. A poll of 30 managing partners at an Investec event held last month revealed that 45% are considering establishing an ABS, and 36% are contemplating becoming a multi-disciplinary practice.

A new Cabinet committee is to review whether the Office for Legal Complaints (OLC) and alternative business structures (ABSs) should be implemented, it emerged yesterday. The news comes as The Times speculated today that the new team at the Ministry of Justice might kick ABSs into the long grass, but investigations by Legal Futures indicate that there is no foundation for this.

The Scottish government has decided to push ahead with regulating non-lawyer will-writers, it has emerged. In a move that will intensify pressure on the Legal Services Board in England and Wales, the government plans to apply a set of regulatory rules, enforcement measures and sanctions to ensure non-lawyer will-writers conform to acceptable industry practice.

Consumers of legal services are not tempted by the prospect of household name brands moving into legal services, research has found. It also revealed that ‘expense’ or ‘expensive’ was the word most commonly associated with the word ‘solicitor’, while almost half of those interviewed felt the experience represented poor value for money.

The Institute of Professional Willwriters today became only the tenth trade body to receive Office of Fair Trading (OFT) approval for its code of practice. This means that the OFT is satisfied that the code provides consumers with protection and offers a higher level of customer service.

Later this year, the Legal Ombudsman will take over the handling of complaints against all lawyers. But as chief ombudsman Adam Sampson explains to Legal Futures Editor Neil Rose, it is as much about helping lawyers as clients.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority has today laid out the detail of its proposed new approach to regulation, including first sight of an outcomes-based code of conduct that at 46 pages is around a sixth the size of the current code.

Scottish solicitors have now voted to allow a minority of external ownership of law firms, it emerged today. In the latest twist of the ongoing saga of members of the Law Society of Scotland trying to find a compromise, two motions were narrowly passed at today’s AGM in favour of alternative business structures, but with inconsistent terms.

All lawyers will have to give clients clear information about how to complain, and their regulators will have to monitor that it is done, the Legal Services Board has announced.

Referral fees should not be banned, but require greater disclosure and more stringent regulation, the Legal Services Consumer Panel has concluded. This could include conveyancing clients providing written consent to be referred and a ban on auctions for work.

The Legal Services Board’s powers to seize control of regulation from the approved regulators is unnecessary and casts a shadow over the independence of the legal profession, the Law Society president has claimed.

There are to be four extra core professional duties when the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) unveils a slimmed-down Code of Conduct later this week, it has emerged. The draft 40-page code – which will form part of an online Solicitors Handbook bringing together all of the SRA’s regulatory regime – is at the heart of next year’s move to outcomes-focused regulation.

There has been a sharp rise in the number of complaints against barristers this year, with solicitors increasingly complaining, Legal Futures can reveal. Complaints received by Dr Ann Barker, the bar’s Complaints Commissioner, were 38% higher in the first quarter of 2010 than in the same period last year.

Chris Marston, Head of Professional Practices at Lloyds TSB Commercial, assesses solicitors’ prospects in a year of change and transition on the regulatory, competition, economic and political fronts

The first effort to build a nationwide network of branded high street solicitors begins today with the opening of 15 branches under the QualitySolicitors name. Firms in the QualitySolicitors’s existing 200-strong network – such as Burroughs Day in Bristol and Howlett Clarke in Brighton – will launch their new branding over the next week with the help of various celebrities