Over 10% of firms opt for unrated insurer
Insurance Age has reported that more than 10% of law firms opt to take out professional indemnity (PI) insurance with an unrated insurer. They cite research from law firm advisors O’Connors who found that 13% of nearly 500 firms surveyed opted for unrated insurers despite high-profile controversies involving insurers like Lemma, Balva and Beliner over […]
SRA update: Balva claim enquiries
The SRA has issued an update advising that they have been contacted to say that Clear Claims Solutions is no longer handling claims on behalf of Balva. With immediate effect, any Balva claims enquiries and notifications should be made direct to Balva, using the following contact details: Address: Balva, E.Birznieka UpiÅ¡a iela 12, LV-1050, Riga, […]
SRA update on referral fee ban
Following the first six months of the ban on referral fees, the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) has issued a warning note based on their experiences so far. Whilst focussed on personal injury the key points could just as easily apply to conveyancers, for instance failure to advise clients properly about the costs and how their […]
BCL Legal speak to LFS Conveyancing Awards Winner Kathryn Simpson
Here at BCL Legal we took the opportunity to speak to LFS Conveyancing Awards Winner Kathryn Simpson. Here is what she had to say: Firstly, what is your role? My role is Head of the Residential Conveyancing Department at Timms Solicitors, a four partner firm with offices in Derby, Swadlincote, Burton and Ashby. I am […]
2013 LFS Conveyancing Conference & Awards
BCL Legal is proud to be sponsoring the 2013 LFS Conveyancing Conference and Awards on Thursday 26th September 2013. We have a dedicated residential property department that solely recruits across conveyancing to include conveyancing assistant through to Partners nationally, so like many of our clients — this really is the event of the year! LFS […]
BCL Legal speak to Professional Services Director at Countrywide Property Lawyers
Alison Roberts, Professional Services Director (Conveyancing Services) at Countrywide Property Lawyers: Conveyancing — a view from volume business What qualities do you look for in a Conveyancer? The obvious ones; commitment professionalism and great communication but also creativity resourcefulness and the ability to solve problems. We don’t want our lawyers needlessly debating legal points whilst […]
Welcome to the Brief from BLC Legal
As ever, this issue of The Brief is jam packed with thought provoking opinion pieces, profiles and interviews from across the legal sector including contributions from Christopher McKenzie of O’Neal Webster, which is a new entrant to the London market; Steven Zdolyny, head of legal at Riverview Solicitors and Elliott Vigar who is head of […]
Advanced Legal announces new partnership with Moneypenny
Advanced Legal (formerly IRIS Legal) has recently announced its latest partnership agreement — with telephone answering specialists Moneypenny. Moneypenny, the UK’s market leader in outsourced call handling and receptionist services, is well known to the UK Legal sector and this agreement is a demonstration of the close working relationship between the two firms — forming […]
STL Group achieves the Legal Eye Quality Standard
Following a rigorous assessment, STL Group has been awarded The Legal Eye Quality Standard. Jaunita Gobby, Director of Legal Eye, said "Legal Eye is delighted to award STL with the Legal Eye Quality Standard. The procedures and policies that STL has in place are of a very high standard and they have a proactive approach […]
Property Forum Dinner sells out in anticipation of keynote speech from George Clarke
The Property Forum Dinner, to be held at the Connaught Rooms in Covent Garden, London today is officially a sell out. SearchFlow is proud to have facilitated the running of the Property Forum Dinner since it started back in the late 1990’s and which is now a regular fixture in the diaries of business owners […]
Green & Anor v The Royal Bank of Scotland Plc [2013] EWCA Civ 1197 (09 October 2013)
Introduction From the outset it is important to note that the Claimants potential claim for breach of statutory duty pursuant to section 150 of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (see below) and the Conduct of Business Rules (“COB”) was abandoned before trial. That was on the basis it was time-barred, the Claim Form […]
Search Acumen Goes from Strength to Strength
London, October 16th 2013: Search Acumen – the new business launched by Mark Riddick and Andrew Lloyd – is delighted to announce that Andy Sommerville is joining the business — this brings together three of the main players behind the creation and subsequent market dominance and leadership of SearchFlow. All three sold their stakes […]
SRA seeks views on cost-saving idea
The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) is seeking views on a cost-saving initiative whereby the amount of time documents are kept following an intervention is reduced. Currently the SRA has six million such documents relating to closed matters in storage, the cost of which is borne by the profession.Only 33,000 documents, or 0.55% of them have […]
House prices up 3.8%
The latest figures from the Office of National Statistics show that in the year to August 2013 house prices increased 3.8%, up from a 3.3% increase in the year to July 2013. As usual prices increased faster than average in London; however growth was stable across the whole of the UK. David Brown, commercial director, […]
Part exchange rises in popularity
According to research from Move with Us the number of new homes sold using part exchange has increased by 11% over the last year. Move with Us puts the increase down to more second-time home buyers using part exchange to trade up as builders have prioritised more family homes in their build-mix. Part exchange (PX) […]
SLC welcomes new sales process
The Society of Licensed Conveyancers (SLC) has welcomed the introduction of a new property sales process which will reduce leasehold transaction times by five to 10 days. We announced the new process, based on a standardised questionnaire for the industry, on Monday. The SLC helped develop the process alongside all the major trade bodies, including […]
When Governments Get Involved in Markets…”Help to Buy” and the Land Registry
Is the Help to Buy scheme good for the market? The purpose is clearly to stimulate demand — albeit artificially through a temporary measure designed to make borrowing easier. However, while volumes are still much lower than the pre-2008 status quo, there appears to be a natural recovery underway anyway. In any event, what is […]
Law Society National Property Conference 2013
David Gilroy of Concious Solutions reviews the Law Society Property Section Conference. by David Gilroy on 13-October-2013 @ 11:00 Friday was the National Property Law Conference of the Property Section of The Law Society. It’s self styled title was “Solicitors fight back”. Any names that are hyperlinked below, lead to their LinkedIn profiles in case […]
SRA correction re Rajob Ali
Last Wednesday the SRA issued a a correction to a statement that it released regarding Rajob Ali. It stated; "The Solicitors Regulation Authority website indicated that the practising certificate of Rajob Ali had been suspended following the intervention into Abode Solicitors. This is not the case, Mr Ali can continue to practise as a solicitor. […]
Lender Performance Survey
Have you ever wished that the conveyancing sector would let lenders know more accurately whether they are good, bad or indifferent in the way that they deal with conveyancers and the impact they have on the conveyancing market? Well now is your chance. On Friday Andrew Baddeley-Chappell of Nationwide challenged the Law Society Property Section […]
