Other lawyers

The Legal Services Board is ramping up pressure on the Law Society, the Bar Council and other approved regulators over ensuring the independence of their regulatory arms.

Firms of licensed conveyancers will only be able to use third-party managed accounts if it is in each client’s best interests, their regulator has proposed.

The role of the conveyancer is undoubtedly going to change as much of the administrative side of the role becomes automated over the coming years, a new report has predicted.

The Bar Standards Board has been told that it needs to act more quickly on how it plans to educate the public about barristers after its widely criticised decision to stop funding Legal Choices.

The Legal Services Board could start reviewing regulators’ case files to increase its oversight of the quality of their disciplinary decisions in the wake of the Leigh Day case, it has emerged.

Demand for notarial services is increasing and Brexit could give it a further boost, the new president of the Notaries Society has said. The challenge was how to recruit enough new notaries to meet demand.

There is evidence that the transparency requirements placed on conveyancers is encouraging consumers to shop around without any sign of a ‘race to the bottom’ on prices, the CLC has found.

The Council for Licensed Conveyancers is set to cut its fees for the firms it regulates by 30%, having originally planned a 20% reduction.

The Legal Services Board has said the Bar Standards Board now meets the standard it set for improving the quality of advocacy – unlike the Solicitors Regulation Authority and CILEx Regulation.

The Bar Standards Board has decided to stop funding Legal Choices, the consumer-facing website which until now has been collectively run and paid for by all the legal regulators.

The Financial Conduct Authority has found “widespread poor practice” in the advertising put out by claims management companies, and begun taking action to address it.

A large commercial law firm will ditch its client account in favour of a third-party managed account by the end of the year, a leading payment processor has predicted.

A law firm regulated by the Intellectual Property Regulation Board has merged with one regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority, in what is believed to be the first deal of its kind.

The Legal Services Board has finalised revised rules to ensure clearer separation of regulatory and representative functions at bodies like the Law Society and Bar Council.

The Legal Services Consumer Panel has criticised legal regulators’ continuing “resistance” to publishing complaints data about the lawyers they oversee.