I have come across plenty of useless solicitors but we’re not all the same and I’m always sad to read ‘they’re all the same’ type comments. A great many people who do conveyancing and other legal work aren’t qualified solicitors, though people still refer to them as ‘my solicitor’, and a great many take on more work than they can cope with at low fees so consequently the service is appalling and mistakes are made. Corners are cut because the margins are so small. I know there will be protests about fees not being low but they have been consistently driven down over the years (I’m talking about since the 70s) by the ‘pile em high’ firms and levels of service have followed the same downward trend. People in general pay a lower hourly rate for conveyancing than they would pay a plumber. I worked mainly in commercial property with high end firms where this didn’t happen and work was accepted only for a proper fee which would allow clients to be given first class professional service. My work came solely from repeat instructions and recommendations, even at an hourly rate of a good few hundred pounds. More time to spend on the client’s work meant less time spent overall so cost effective for them and for my firms. As with everything you get what you pay for but so many people won’t pay a proper rate for the job and end up complaining and tarring the entire profession with the same brush. Incidentally lawyers in the big firms such as mine also do a lot of pro bono work, for instance for victims of domestic abuse, free work for people with no money, but that’s never spoken of. Not something the ‘pile em high’ firms tend to do.
