Standard Terms of Business

1. These terms and how we can change them

1.1 Our agreement with you

These terms, together with our engagement letter to you, form our agreement with you to provide legal services. These terms apply to each matter we work on with you. If there is a conflict between these terms and our engagement letter, these terms will prevail, unless the engagement letter expressly overrides them.

1.2 Changes to these terms

We can change these terms from time to time. We will tell you about any changes before they take effect. If you instruct us after the date of the change, you will be deemed to have accepted the new terms. If you object to any change, you may terminate your instructions as described in paragraph 10.

2. Who we are

2.1 Our staff

Our services are provided by the staff of our law firm. References to "we" in these terms mean our firm and our staff, acting on our behalf. Our staff include partners, members, directors, consultants, employees and agents.

2.2 No personal liability of staff

Our staff provide services on behalf of our firm, and not in a personal capacity. Unless we agree otherwise, you agree not to bring any claim against any individual member of staff in their personal capacity.

3. Our services

3.1 Matters outside the scope of our instructions

We only advise on matters within the scope of our instructions, as set out in our engagement letter. Unless your engagement letter clearly says otherwise, we will not advise you on the financial or tax aspects of this matter, or on your wider tax or financial interests, advice on the law of jurisdictions outside of England and Wales, or accounting and commercial advice (including on the viability and prudence of this matter), even if a relevant issue arises during the course of our work together. You may wish to seek separate specialist advice on these matters.

3.2 Only you can rely on our advice

Our advice is intended solely for you. We do not accept or assume responsibility to anyone other than the clients identified in our engagement letter. Unless we agree otherwise in writing, you must not share our advice with anyone else.

3.3 Third party service providers

We may instruct third parties (such as, but not limited to, barristers, expert witnesses, enquiry agents) to provide services to you. Where appropriate we may instruct these third parties as your agent, so that you contract with them directly. Howsoever the third parties are instructed, you are responsible for the sums charged by third parties and their services are provided to you on their terms. We use reasonable skill and care in selecting and appointing third parties and provided that we do so, we are not responsible for the services the third parties provide.

3.4 We're not responsible for delays outside our control

If our services to you are delayed by an event outside our control, we contact you as soon as possible to let you know and do what we can to reduce the delay. As long as we do this, we won't compensate you for the delay, but you always have rights to terminate your instructions, see paragraph 10.

4. What you agree to do

4.1 You agree to:

• (a) Provide us with clear, timely and consistent instructions, and respond fully, frankly and quickly to our requests for information and co-operate with us and those we instruct on your behalf. The information you give us must be full and accurate, to the best of your knowledge and belief. We don't verify the information you give us unless we have expressly agreed to do so.
• (b) Tell us straight away if your contact details change.
• (c) Take reasonable steps to properly secure your communications with us. This includes protecting the email and computer systems used for your matter.
• (d) Respect our regulatory restrictions. If we tell you that we can't do something for you because doing it would breach our legal, professional, or regulatory duties then you must respect this.
• (e) Pay money on account and our invoices. You must provide us with any required sums on account of costs (see paragraph 6.5) and pay our invoices in accordance with these terms (see paragraph 7).
• (f) Verify any change of our payment details received by email. If you are told about any change of our bank details by email, then even if it appears to come from our firm, you must call us immediately to check the email is genuine.

5. Our communications with you

5.1 Risks of email correspondence

For convenience and speed, we will correspond with you by email and rely on communications coming from your email account. However, email is inherently insecure. We are not responsible for loss or damage caused by email use, provided we have taken reasonable security measures, including against viruses or similar harmful items.

5.2 Blocked emails

Our filtering software may prevent us receiving emails from you or in relation to your matter and we are not responsible to you for losses resulting from this.

5.3 Opening hours

We are normally open between 9.00 am and 5.00 pm Monday to Friday, except for bank holidays. Our staff may sometimes respond to communications and work outside of our normal office hours, but this is at our discretion.

5.4 Who we can give advice to and whose instructions we can act on

We may give advice and information to, and act on instructions from, any of the individuals to whom our engagement letter is addressed without the need to copy such advice to, or to confirm such instructions with, the other(s). You can let us know in writing that we are authorised to deal with someone else on your behalf in this way.

5.5 We can adjust to your communications needs

As a firm, we wish to support and promote equality and diversity. If it would assist you for our services to be delivered in a different way, please let us know and we will investigate how we can assist.

6. Our fees, disbursements and expenses

6.1 How we calculate our fees

Our fees for our services are calculated either on the basis of time spent or on a fixed, capped basis and may be staged, as set out in our engagement letter.

6.2 Fees on a time spent basis

• (a) Six-minute units. We calculate the time spent by us in six-minute units and charge it at the hourly rate for the person doing the work.
• (b) Increases in hourly rates. We may increase our hourly rates, for example at the start of a new year or if the matter becomes more urgent. We give you advance notice of any increases.
• (c) Estimates are not binding. Any estimate of the total charges for dealing with your matter is not binding. We may update estimates as a matter progresses.

6.3 Fixed and capped fees

• (a) Changes in assumptions. If the assumptions on which the fixed or capped fee are based prove incorrect we may increase our fee or switch to charging you on a time-spent basis.
• (b) Charges on termination. If you terminate our instructions (other than because we are at fault) we can charge you the full fixed fee unless you are a consumer, in which case we will charge you on a time spent basis for the work done.

6.4 Disbursements, expenses and VAT

All fees quoted are exclusive of disbursements (e.g. barrister fees, expert witnesses), expenses (e.g. travel, document production), and VAT, which you must pay in addition.

6.5 Payments on account

We normally hold some money from you as security against non-payment of our charges until a matter is concluded. We can require you to pay an appropriate amount on account before we start work and to top it up from time to time.

6.6 Funding our fees

Typically, we work on a privately paying basis. Other options may be available including conditional fee agreements, trade union funding, insurance, legal aid, third party litigation funding, or After the Event insurance. Please contact us if you would like to discuss these options.

7. Our invoices

7.1 When we invoice you

We invoice you regularly and on completion of your matter or at the intervals indicated in your engagement letter.

7.2 We can invoice disbursements and expenses at any time

We can invoice you for disbursements and expenses for any period at any time, even after we have invoiced our fees for that period.

7.3 Payment is due on receipt

Payment is due on receipt. We charge interest on unpaid bills at a rate of 8% above the Bank of England's base rate. Interest will begin to run before securing judgment.

7.4 You are responsible for our charges

You are responsible for our charges, even if you have third party funding or someone else has agreed or been ordered to pay them.

7.5 Multiple clients are jointly and severally liable

If we are instructed by more than one person, then we can require any of those persons to pay our bills in full (joint and several liability).

7.6 How to complain about our bills

To complain about an invoice, please follow our complaints procedure (see paragraph 13). You can also ask the court to assess our bill of costs under Part III of the Solicitors Act 1974, subject to certain time limits and conditions.

8. How we hold your money and pay you interest on it

8.1 Where we hold your money

We may hold money on your behalf in our client account in Lloyds Bank plc. We are not responsible for any loss resulting from the failure of any bank. Our client account is covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS), which covers a maximum of £85,000.

8.2 Interest on money we hold for you

We pay interest on cleared funds in our client account at a rate specified on our website, compounded quarterly. We pay interest at the end of a matter. We do not pay interest where the amount accrued is less than £20, on money held to pay disbursements, or on money held for the Legal Aid Agency.

9. How we limit our liability to you

9.1 Liabilities not excluded

Nothing in these terms limits any liability which cannot legally be limited, including liability for death or personal injury caused by negligence, fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation.

9.2 Exclusion of indirect and consequential loss (business customers only)

Subject to paragraph 9.1, if you are a business, we will not be liable to you for any indirect or consequential loss.

9.3 Losses we are not liable for

Subject to paragraph 9.1, we will not be liable for loss arising from: compliance with legal and regulatory duties; errors in third party services (provided we used reasonable care in selecting them); circumstances beyond our control; loss caused by email use (provided we took reasonable security measures); or failure of any bank.

9.4 Limits where other advisers are also responsible

Subject to paragraph 9.1, our liability to you shall be reduced to the extent we can prove that you would have been able to recover a contribution from another adviser on the same matter under the Civil Liability (Contribution) Act 1978.

9.5 Caps on our liability

We may agree a liability cap for any given matter, ordinarily in our engagement letter. We will not cap our liability below £3 million (the minimum professional indemnity insurance cover required).

10. How you and we can terminate our agreement

10.1 You and we can terminate this agreement

You may terminate your instructions to us at any time by telling us in writing. We can also stop acting for you if we have reasonable grounds to do so, for example if you have broken our agreement, if trust and confidence has broken down, if we discover a conflict of interest, or if to proceed would be contrary to legal or regulatory duties.

10.2 Payments on termination

If you terminate your instructions or we stop acting for you, you must pay our charges incurred up to the point of termination, as well as any charges we incur after termination (e.g. transferring your file to another adviser).

10.3 We can retain your documents until you pay

If you do not pay our invoices on time, we can retain documents, deeds and other items relating to any matter we are working on for you until you have done so.

11. How you can use our advice and how we handle your documents

11.1 Intellectual property rights

We retain all intellectual property rights in the advice which we provide and the documents which we prepare but permit you to make use of such work for the purposes of your particular matter only.

11.2 Treatment of your documents on completion

When your matter completes or we stop acting for you, unless you request the return of any documents you have supplied to us, we will treat them in accordance with our document retention policy (available from us on request).

12. Our legal status, how we are regulated and our insurance

12.1 Our legal status and VAT details

We are a private limited company registered in England and Wales with company number 14920678. Our registered office is at Derriford House, Pinewood Hill, Fleet, Hants, GU51 3AW. Our VAT number is 458 8557 32.

12.2 How we are regulated

We are a firm of solicitors authorised and regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA). Our SRA number is 8004856. You can find out more about the SRA and view the professional rules which apply to us on the SRA website.

12.3 Our ability to provide financial services

We are not authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority. However, solicitors are able to provide certain financial services incidental to their legal work while regulated by the SRA.

12.4 How we are insured

As required by our professional rules, we maintain professional indemnity insurance to protect clients in the unlikely event of a mistake being made. Contact details for our insurers are available on request.

12.5 SRA Compensation Fund

The SRA Compensation Fund provides certain protection if a solicitor fails to pay money owed to a client or is dishonest. Learn more at www.sra.org.uk.

13. Complaints and other concerns

13.1 Our complaints process

If at any stage you have concerns or wish to make a complaint, inform the person handling your matter straight away. If you do not feel comfortable, you can contact our complaints partner directly. We will write to you within eight weeks setting out our final response to the complaint.

13.2 Alternative dispute resolution

Alternative dispute resolution bodies such as Ombudsman Services, ProMediate and Small Claims Mediation can deal with complaints about legal services.

13.3 Complaining to the Legal Ombudsman

Consumers and smaller organisations may be entitled to complain to the Legal Ombudsman. Complaints should normally be made within six months of receiving our final response and no more than one year from the date when the problem arose. Contact: Legal Ombudsman, PO Box 6806, Wolverhampton, WV1 9WJ. Email: [email protected]. Tel: 0300 555 0333.

13.4 Reporting professional misconduct to the SRA

Clients can report suspected professional misconduct to the SRA. Examples include dishonesty, taking or losing your money, or treating you unfairly because of your age, a disability or other characteristic.

14. Confidentiality

14.1 When we may use and disclose your confidential information

We will keep confidential information we obtain through our services confidential, but we reserve the right to use and disclose it to: deliver those services; comply with the law (including conflicts checks and anti-money laundering reporting); and comply with requests by regulators and other competent authorities.

15. Data protection

15.1 Our privacy policy

For information about how we deal with your personal information, see our privacy policy.

15.2 Sensitive information

In some cases, we may hold more sensitive information about an individual such as about health. This may be necessary to pursue your legal matter.

15.3 Withdrawing consent

You can withdraw consent to your information being used in a particular way, but this may limit what more we can do for you.

15.4 Future communications

As a client we may in the future send you a newsletter or similar. We will never share your information with third parties to market to you and will not contact you about non-legal services. We will make it quick and easy for you to opt out.

15.5–15.10 Information storage, automated decisions and your rights

Your information may be stored on computer servers within the UK or the EU. We do not use your personal information to make automated decisions. We will not share your information with third parties unless required for your legal matter. We generally retain files for six years after payment of the final bill. If you wish to exercise your data protection rights, please contact our information officer (details on our website). You may also complain to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) at www.ico.org.uk.

16. Anti-money laundering and financial crime procedures

16.1 As a firm of solicitors, we must comply with legal and regulatory requirements aimed at preventing crime. You agree to co-operate with us to verify your identity, business structure, and sources of income. We may check your credit rating.

16.2 If we have to report information about you to the National Crime Agency, we may be prevented by law from informing you. We can stop work on your matter and withhold your money without notice until the issue is resolved.

16.3 We do not accept cash. There are strict limits on how our client account operates.

17. Other important terms

17.1 This contract is between you and us. Other than our staff, nobody else has rights under it or can enforce it.

17.2 If a court invalidates some of this contract, the rest of it will still apply.

17.3 These terms are governed by English and Welsh law, and you can bring claims against us in the English and Welsh courts. If you live in Scotland, you can bring claims in either the Scottish or the English courts. If you live in Northern Ireland, you can bring claims in either the Northern Irish or the English courts.