Terms and Conditions of Business
and
General Information for Clients

1. The conduct of your matter

Gordon Tennent will conduct all work on your behalf in this matter.

2. Charges and expenses

  1. Our charges are based mainly on the time we spend in dealing with a matter. Time spent on your affairs will include meetings with you and perhaps others; time spent travelling; considering, preparing and working on papers; correspondence; and making and receiving telephone calls.
  2. We will charge £275 per hour for each hour engaged on your matter by Gordon Tennent. In the majority of cases an uplift will not be charged but in cases of sufficient seriousness or complexity we reserve the right to increase the level of hourly rates. We will inform you in advance of our intention. The size of any uplift will be determined after consultation with you and agreement has been reached with you. If we are unable to reach agreement we reserve the right to cease acting and to invoice you for the work completed up to that point in time.
  3. Time is charged on the basis of units of one tenth of an hour (i.e. 6 minutes). This is the minimum unit charged, so that an attendance of less than 6 minutes will be charged as 6 minutes.
  4. We reserve the right to revise our charge-out rates during the conduct of a matter, and will notify you promptly of any change that is made. We review our basic charge-out rates annually.
  5. Where applicable, value added tax will be added to our charges at the rate that applies when the work is done.
  6. We shall, where necessary instruct counsel and/or obtain other expert advice and incur other expenses (e.g. court fees, courier costs and third party photocopying costs) for the proper conduct of your case. We will endeavour to give you an accurate estimate of any such costs, but in certain cases, such as Counsel/expert’s fees where it is only possible to estimate the cost initially, we will require you to accept our estimate of those fees until a final invoice is rendered by Counsel or the expert.
  7. We are happy to provide an estimate of costs in advance of work being carried out on any matter in which we are instructed. Obviously, such an estimate will be given on the basis of our previous experience of similar matters. It is always possible that costs will exceed an estimate given due to unforeseen factors (including the way in which the other side, or indeed you yourself, may decide to conduct the matter concerned). We will warn you in advance if it appears likely that an estimate will be exceeded.

3. Billing arrangements

  1. You shall at all times be jointly and severally liable for payment of our charges and expenses.
  2.  For non-contentious work we will generally send you a final bill after work has been completed. For contentious work and where appropriate for protracted non contentious matters we will send you interim bills for our charges and expenses at reasonably regular intervals while work on a matter is in progress.
  3. Payment is due to us within 14 days of our sending you a bill. We reserve the right to charge you interest on the bill from the end of this 14-day period at the rate payable on judgment debts (currently 8% per annum) if you do not make payment within this time. Interest will be charged on a daily basis.
  4.  Any bill that remains unpaid for a period greater than 14 days after it has been delivered entitles us, at our option, to cease acting for you. Notice of our decision to cease acting will be conveyed to you in writing.
  5.  If you have any query about a bill, you should contact Gordon Tennent straight away.

4. Litigation Costs

  1.  It is important for you to understand that, unless we agree otherwise, you are at all times primarily responsible for paying the whole of our charges and expenses. We will discuss with you whether those charges and expenses might ultimately be reimbursed to you by another party. Any recovery you are able to obtain from your opponent in respect of your costs will serve to reimburse you in respect of the amounts that you are responsible for paying to us.
  2.  In litigation matters which result in court hearings, the general rule is that the loser will be ordered to pay the winner’s costs, assessed by the court on what is known as the “standard basis”. This means that if you win the case, you might be able to recover from your opponent some of the charges and expenses that you have to pay to us. If you lose the case, however, the reverse will apply and you might be required to pay some or all of your opponent’s costs. You should also be aware that, even if you win the case, the charges and expenses which you will have to pay to us are likely to be greater than the amount you can actually recover from your opponent. This is because costs assessed on the standard basis typically represent around 60-70% or so of actual costs incurred. It is also possible that your opponent may not have sufficient assets to make payment of any amount ordered.
  3.  The financial value of a claim may determine the amount of recoverable costs (which may be substantially less than the costs actually incurred). Currently, virtually no costs are recoverable for claims under £10,000 (“small claims”) and there are restrictions on costs recoverable on claims allocated to the fast track system. We will advise you of any costs restrictions where appropriate.
  4. There are exceptions to the general rules outlined above. The court has a wide discretion when making orders on costs and, in addition to analysing which party has “won” the case, it will take into account other factors such as the conduct of the parties, whether a party has succeeded on part of the case even if that party has not been wholly successful, and offers made to settle the proceedings. The court also has power, in very limited circumstances, to award costs to a party on what is known as the “indemnity basis” rather than the standard basis. The effect of this is that the party to whom the costs are being awarded will generally be entitled to receive a larger portion of its actual costs (possibly up to 100% of those costs).
  5.  If the other party proves to be financially unsound, you may not get back any of your costs even if you win the case. If the other party is publicly funded, it is probable that you will not be able to recover any of your costs.
  6. You will be responsible for paying to us the costs of seeking to recover any costs that the court orders your opponent to pay to you.
  7. You should also be aware that, under the Civil Procedure Rules, the court is empowered to make costs orders against parties involved in litigation which are to be paid while the litigation progresses (rather than following the conclusion of the litigation, as was formerly the case). If the court does make any such orders against you during the course of the case, you will be required to place us in funds immediately (as payment to the other party will generally be required within a short period of time, i.e. within 7 or 14 days). Failure to make payment to the other party in accordance with a time limit fixed by the court may cause serious prejudice to your case. We will advise you prior to any court application of any potential costs order which may be made against you.

5. Storage of papers and documents

  • After completing work for you, we are entitled to keep all your papers and documents while there is money owing to us for our charges and expenses. Where no amounts are owing to us, we will keep our file(s) of papers on a matter (except for any of your papers which you ask to be returned to you) for no more than 6 years from the date of the final bill sent to you on that matter. We keep the file(s) on the understanding that we have the authority to destroy it/them once such 6 year period has elapsed.

6. Termination

  1.  You may terminate your instructions to us in writing at any time, but you agree that we will be entitled to keep all your papers and documents while there is money owing to us for our charges and expenses (as set out in paragraph 5 above).
  2. In some circumstances, we may consider that we ought to stop acting for you (for example, if you cannot give clear or proper instructions on how we are to proceed). We may only decide to stop acting for you with good reason (for example, if you do not pay an interim bill or comply with our request for a payment on account). We must give you reasonable notice that we will stop acting for you in such circumstances.
  3. If you or we decide that we will no longer act for you, you will pay our charges and expenses on the basis set out above up to the date on which we cease to act for you.

7. Complaints

  • If you are dissatisfied with the conduct of the action, you should in the first instance contact Gordon Tennent to explain your dissatisfaction. If you are still not satisfied, you should then put your complaints in writing and we will endeavour to answer all your concerns. If you remain dissatisfied then you may make a complaint to the Legal Ombudsman at PO Box 6806 Wolverhampton WV1 9WJ. A full copy of our complaints policy will be supplied to you as part of our induction pack. It is also available on our website – tennentssolicitors.co.uk
  • If you consider that we have been negligent you should terminate our services and take advice elsewhere. We are covered by compulsory insurance arrangements against claims for negligence.

8. Money Laundering and Identification Procedures

  • We are required to comply with anti-money laundering legislation, and we will therefore request information or documentation from you in order to ensure that we are acting in accordance with the law. For example, we are required to verify your identity and address. If you are a company/ partnership, we are also required to ensure that the person/s from whom we are to take instructions has/have the authority to provide instructions on the company’s/ partnership’s behalf. You agree to comply with any requests for information or documentation that we may make in order to comply with our legal obligations.

9. Electronic and Internet Communication

  1. Unless you advise us otherwise you shall be deemed to have consented to us corresponding with you by means of the internet or other electronic media. Whilst we will take reasonable steps to safeguard the security and confidentiality of the information transmitted, you acknowledge that we cannot guarantee its security and confidentiality.
  2. Internet email may be susceptible to data corruption, interception and unauthorised amendment for which we do not accept liability. Whilst efforts are made to safeguard messages and attachments, we cannot guarantee that messages or attachments are virus free, do not contain malicious code or other harmful matter or are compatible with your electronic systems and we do not accept liability in respect of viruses, malicious code or other harmful matter or any related problems that you may experience.

10. Data Protection

  • Details of the individual to whom these terms and conditions are sent, together (where relevant) with details of other key individuals in a client organisation supplied to us from time to time, will be entered into our client database. We will not disclose any information about you to any third party without first obtaining your prior written consent.

11. Agreement

  1. Unless otherwise agreed, these terms of business will only apply to the first instructions that you give us.
  2. Your continuing instructions in this matter will amount to your acceptance of these terms and conditions of business. Even so, we ask you to please sign and date these terms and conditions, keep a copy for your records, and return the original to us immediately. We can then be confident that you and we both agree and understand the basis on which we act for you.