Terms of Business

TABLE OF CONTENTS

OUR CONTRACT

DEFINED TERMS

YOUR RESPONSIBILITIES

CLIENT CARE STANDARDS

OUR SERVICES TO YOU AND OUR FEES

CONFIDENTIALITY AND YOUR INSTRUCTIONS

INVOICES FOR WORK CARRIED OUT

HOURS OF BUSINESS

CONFLICT OF INTEREST

DATA PROTECTION AND PRIVACY

RETENTION AND TRANSFER OF FILES

INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

FORCE MAJEURE

RIGHTS OF THIRD PARTIES

TERMINATION

MONEY LAUNDERING REGULATIONS /PROCEEDS OF CRIME ACT

SEVERABILITY

EQUALITY AND DIVERSITY

FINANCIAL SERVICES

COMPLAINTS PROCEDURE

LAW AND JURISDICTION

DISCLAIMER

PROVISIONS RELATING TO CONTENTIOUS LITIGATION

PROFESSIONAL INDEMNITY INSURANCE

ACCEPTANCE

REGULATORY INFORMATION

1.OUR CONTRACT

These Terms of Business issued by Robsons Legal also trading as Babylaw and Settlementagreements4u (hereinafter referred to as “the Company”), as supplemented and/or amended by any relevant Client Care Letter; apply to each Matter we work on for you. No variation of these Terms shall be effective, unless it is in writing and is signed by the Company.

DEFINED TERMS

In these Terms of Business:-

“Services” means any specific transaction, dispute or issue in relation to which you ask us to provide Services whether or not it has been defined in a Client Care Letter or other agreement;

"Documents" means documents we create or receive on your behalf (including communications from or with third parties, notes of conversations and meetings, draft and final documents, and instructions to and opinions of barristers);

"Documents Held For You" means letters sent to you, copies held by us on our files, your letters to us including all electronic communication, notes of telephone conversations and meetings together with our research notes and materials

"Client Care Letter" contains your instructions and our terms of business which you agree to enter into. We will retain a signed copy of the Client Care Letter on our file. Any updated instructions or variation to our instruction will result in a revised client care letter being sent to you which shall supersede the prior

YOUR RESPONSIBILITIES
- You will (so far as you are practicably able to do so):-
  - provide us with timely instructions, information and materials necessary or desirable for us to perform the Services for you;
  - notify us promptly of any changes or additions to instructions, information and materials previously provided by you or on your behalf; and
  - ensure that all information provided to us is complete in all material respects and not misleading.

CLIENT CARE STANDARDS

We are committed wholeheartedly to the professional standards laid down by the Solicitors Regulation Authority.
- You will be told clearly at the outset the issues and how we advise they be dealt with, and the immediate steps we will take on your behalf.

The Client Care letter notifies you of the following details:-

the name of the person or persons who is/are dealing on a day to day basis with your matter; and

You will be told the name of the new fee earner if the matter is transferred from one fee earner to another.

We cannot guarantee that the fee earner or Supervising Partner will be available on demand, but we will do our best to get back to you promptly and efficiently.

You will be informed of the progress of your matter and the reason for any serious delay.

If you do not understand anything, please always ask. We are happy to explain.

You will be informed of our complaints handling procedure.

You will be given timescales and estimates for your instructions and provided with updates along the way

OUR SERVICES TO YOU AND OUR FEES

You give us full authority to act for you to the fullest extent necessary or desirable to provide the Services. In particular, we may engage barristers and other third parties and otherwise incur on your behalf reasonable expenses of a type which it is necessary or desirable to incur in relation to the Services in question.

If we so require, you will contract directly with any third party so engaged by us and assume direct responsibility to them for the payment of their fees and expenses.

We may, in accordance with professional guidelines, also charge a premium (where reasonable to do so) to take account of the nature, responsibility, complexity, value and urgency of the Services and other criteria specified in those guidelines.

The fixed hourly rates of each of our fee earners and other staff are reviewed from time to time and we will inform you of any variation in these rates and the date upon which they take effect.

You will be responsible for paying the expenses we incur in the course of providing the Services (including travel and subsistence expenses, search and filing fees, court fees and barristers’, foreign lawyers’ and other third parties’ fees and expenses). We have no obligation to pay for such expenses unless you have provided us with the funds for that purpose.

The provision of figures (orally or in writing) from time to time for the likely cost of a piece of work is an estimate only and does not constitute a contract to carry out the work at that cost until such time as it is accepted by you in writing.

The provision of a written quotation for work constitutes an offer to carry out the work at that cost. Unless stated in writing to the contrary, any quotation or estimate does not include any expenses.

Where we carry out work which falls outside the scope of an accepted quotation (or of an estimate which is subsequently incorporated into a contract between us) we may charge fees at our fixed hourly rates, in addition to the quoted or estimated fee. We may also charge additional fees on the same basis for work within the scope of such a quotation or estimate which is made more time consuming, onerous or urgent as a result of circumstances or information which we did not know or could not reasonably have anticipated at the time of the quotation or estimate (whether or not you were aware of them/it)

You may have the benefit of legal expenses insurance which may be included in your household and/or business insurance and it is your responsibility to check your policies to see if you are covered. Your policy may cover your costs and/or your liability to pay the other side’s costs. If you believe you are covered, please discuss this with us so that we can assist you in notifying your insurer.

In the event of a dispute being settled via a Settlement Agreement, it is often the case that an employer party will pay a reasonable contribution towards the employee party’s fees.

We will use reasonable skill and care in the provision of the Services. Where we make an assessment for you, either expressly or by implication, of the likely level of risk associated with different potential courses of action, you accept that such assessment is made relying only upon the information and documents then available to us and cannot, therefore, be definitive. Accordingly, such an assessment should only be used as one element in the making of any practical or commercial decision. You accept that the magnitude or acceptability of a risk is a matter for you.

The aggregate liability of the Firm including all employees and agents of the Firm and any service company owned or controlled by or on behalf of any of the Firm in any circumstances whatsoever, whether in contract, tort, under statute or otherwise, and howsoever caused (including but not limited to our negligence or non-performance), for loss or damage arising from or in connection with the Services provided shall, in relation to each matter and each series of related matters and claims, be limited to the sum, unless otherwise agreed, of one million pounds (£1,000,000.00)

Confidentiality and Your Instructions

We will treat any information which is confidential to you and which we obtain as a result of acting for you as strictly confidential, save for the purpose of acting for you; or for legitimate interest disclosures to our auditors or other advisers or for the purposes of our professional indemnity insurance or as required by law.

We may use the information which you provide, or which we obtain through our dealings with you, or others for the provision of Services to fulfil our contractual obligations to you or the legitimate interests of you, ourselves and others. We may give it on a confidential basis to our employees and agents. We may use it to administer your account with us, including tracing and collecting any debts.

Our advice and other communications with you are confidential and may not, without our consent, be disclosed by you to any third party (other than to your employees and agents who require access and who do not disclose it further) or otherwise made public except as required by law or other regulatory authority to which you are subject. If, as a result of our acting for you, you acquire any information in respect of which we notify you that we owe a duty of confidentiality to a third party you will keep it confidential and not use it without our consent.

We shall communicate with you at the postal and email addresses and the telephone numbers which you provide us with unless you ask us to use other addresses and numbers. You will notify us if you regard any communications from us as particularly confidential and the means by which you require us to make such communications and we shall have no liability to you arising out of your failure so to notify us.

Subject to any notification you may make to us under the previous paragraph, we shall not be required to encrypt, password-protect or digitally sign any email, or attachment, sent by us. We shall not be responsible for any loss or damage arising from the unauthorised interception, re-direction, copying or reading of e-mails, including any attachments. We shall not be responsible for the effect on any hardware or software (or any loss or damage arising from any such effect) of any e-mails or attachment which may be transmitted by us (save to the extent caused by our negligence or wilful default).

We will try to meet any deadline we agree with you for the performance of any Services but, unless we agree otherwise in writing in relation to any time, date or period for delivery or performance by us, time shall not be of the essence.

INVOICES FOR WORK CARRIED OUT

Unless otherwise agreed in the Client Care Letter, we will be entitled to invoice you in respect of our fees and expenses monthly and on completion of your matter. At the end of our financial year we shall be entitled to bring up to date our invoicing in respect of any unbilled work owed by you whether or not the matter has concluded or not.

There may be a delay in invoicing expenses incurred on your behalf pending our receipt of the relevant invoices from third parties. Unless otherwise stated, such invoices are not a final invoice in relation to such expenses.

Interest will accrue on all debts unpaid by over 28 days until the time they are paid at the rate of 8% above the Bank of England’s Base Rate. Any debts that have to be chased will incur a third party handling charge of £100 plus VAT.

If you do not pay any invoice within 28 days of its issue date or any sum we have requested on account within 28 days (or such longer period as we may specify) of our demand, we may suspend or terminate the provision of all or any Services (and instruct any third parties engaged by us to suspend the provision of their services) and may invoice you for all accrued fees and expenses.

We may hold a lien over your file of papers held by us in the event of outstanding fees due to us.

HOURS OF BUSINESS

The normal hours of opening of the Firm is between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. on weekdays. We do offer an out of hours service as we appreciate it can be difficult to discuss employment issues during standard working hours.

CONFLICT OF INTEREST

“Conflict of Interest” means any situation where we owe (or, if we accepted your instructions, would owe) separate duties to act in the best interests of two or more clients in relation to the same or a related matter and those duties conflict, or there is a significant risk that those duties may conflict; or our duty to act in your best interests in relation to a matter conflicts, or there is a significant risk that it may conflict, with our own interests in relation to that or a related matter; or we have confidential information in relation to a client or former client, and you wish to instruct us on a matter where that information might reasonably be expected to be material; and you have an interest adverse to our other client or former client.

We may act for parties engaged in activities similar to or competitive with yours.

Once we have agreed to act for you in relation to your matter, we will not act for a third party if there is a Conflict of Interest between that third party’s interests and your interests.

We may decline to act for you where accepting your instructions would create a Conflict of Interest or cause us to break an existing agreement with a third party.

If, whether through a change in circumstances or otherwise, we find that we have agreed to provide Services to you in circumstances which give, or could give, rise to a conflict of interest we will discuss with you how to deal with the conflict and may, be obliged to stop providing Services to you and/or to all other clients affected by the Conflict of Interest.

DATA PROTECTION AND PRIVACY POLICY

We may use your data to contact you by letter, telephone, e-mail or otherwise about our services and about events such as seminars and conferences and to send you briefings and similar material. Contacting you by electronic means requires your specific and verifiable consent. By signing and returning a copy of the Authority to Act sent to you with your Client Care Letter you are agreeing that we may use your contact details and information in this way. If you do not wish to be contacted, or having provided consent previously you wish to withdraw or amend it, please inform us in writing.

We may store information about you, your matter and any other documents relating to your matter using cloud based technology. We contend we have a legitimate interest in acting in this way and take every precaution to protect your personal data.

We outsource services to third parties including typing/photocopying and other administration duties on our behalf to ensure this is done promptly. We believe we have a legitimate interest in doing this. We will always seek a confidentiality agreement with these outsourced providers. If you do not want your file to be outsourced, please tell us as soon as possible.

You have a series of rights outlined under Data Protection legislation over how your personal data is used, including erasure in specific circumstances. However, we may not always be able to agree with the exercise of such rights, as often your personal data remains necessary in relation to the purpose for which it was originally collected and processed.

The categories of personal data we process include general personal data (which includes normal personal data, personal identity, email addresses and personal financial data) and special categories of personal data if these have been voluntarily provided to us (which includes ethnicity, nationality and medical history).

When your file is open, the personal data is necessary in relation to the purpose for which it was originally intended. We process your personal information to fulfil our contract with you, or where you or we have a legitimate interest in doing so, where otherwise permitted by law, or to comply with applicable law and regulation. We use your personal information for:

Service provision and internal processing

Management of relationship

Resolving queries.

Training and service review

Statistical analysis

Complying with legal obligations

When your matter is completed and / or your file is closed, we may still process your personal information where we have a legitimate interest in doing so, where we are permitted by law, or to comply with applicable laws and regulation. Examples of such instances will include:

Complying with legal obligations for statutory and regulatory requirements including for example, HMRC Returns, complaint handling, anti-money laundering, reporting to our regulatory body

Archiving and Storage of your file; and

Our legitimate interests to conduct conflict of interest checks, statistical analysis and research to help us enhance our products and services.

We may share your personal data with a range of organisations which enable us to fulfil our contract with you, or where we have legitimate interests to do so, or otherwise are required by applicable law and regulation. We can provide more details specific to your personal data on request.

You have a right to complain to the Information Commissioner's Office (https://ww.ico.org.uk ), which regulates the processing of personal data. You may also seek a judicial remedy.

A copy of our data protection policy and privacy policy is available on request.

RETENTION AND TRANSFER OF FILES

We will, at your request, either during the provision or after completion of any Services, release to you or to your order all documents held for you provided that we are not at the time exercising our right to retain or lien documents pending payment of outstanding fees and expenses or are prevented by any court order, undertaking or other legal constraint from doing so. We may copy or scan all such documents before releasing them, including any electronic correspondence submitted by you.

Unless expressly agreed otherwise in writing we will keep your file of papers and documents whether in original, copy or imaged Form for a period of six (6) years, after which we will destroy them and any copies or images of them.

We do not accept responsibility for the loss or damage of any item which we hold on your behalf unless we expressly agree in writing to the contrary.

We reserve the right to make a charge of Fifty Pounds (£50.00) plus V.A.T. in respect of delivery in the event that you request your file or any Deeds or Documents from it. We may also charge you both for time spent photocopying and producing stored papers that are requested as well as reading correspondence or other work necessary to comply with your instructions in relation to the retrieved papers.

INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS

We retain copyright and all other intellectual property rights in all documents and other works we develop or generate for you in providing the Services

We may retain, for our subsequent use, a copy of the advice or opinion of any barrister or other third party given in written form (or any note of any advice or opinion) obtained in the course of providing the Services. Any barrister or other third party will be instructed on the basis that any such advice or opinion will be so retained.

FORCE MAJEURE

a. We shall not be liable for any failure to perform, or delay in performing, any obligations (other than payment and indemnity obligations) if and to the extent that the failure or delay is caused by Force Majeure and the time for performance of the obligation, the performance of which is affected by Force Majeure, shall be extended accordingly

14. RIGHTS OF THIRD PARTIES

a. The Services are provided to and for the benefit of you as our client and you alone. No other person may use or rely upon the Services nor derive any rights or benefits from them. The provisions of the Contracts (Rights of Third Parties) Act 1999 are to that extent excluded.

b. The Firm alone will provide the Services and you agree that you will not bring any claim whether in contract, tort, under statute or otherwise against any principal, consultant, employee or agent of the Firm or any service company owned or controlled by or on behalf of any principal, consultant, employee and agent shall be entitled to rely on the terms of this agreement insofar as they limit their liability.

15. TERMINATION

a. An agreement between you and us for the provision of Services will end on the completion of the provision of those Services. Unless new or different terms are agreed, our acceptance of instructions to perform Services for you subsequent to the ending of any agreement gives rise, from the time of acceptance of the instructions, to a new agreement on these terms.

b. Either you or we may terminate the provision of all or any of the Services at any time by giving written notice to the other. Examples of our right to terminate the provision of our Services include but are not limited to the following

the threat or risk of violence, injury, threatening or abusive behaviour or other danger to the physical, psychological or moral well-being of any of our personnel; or

the discovery or creation of a Conflict of Interest; or

your requesting us to break the law or any professional requirement; or

the relationship of trust and confidence necessary between solicitor and client ceasing to exist between us; or

your failure to pay to us any amount due, or money on account requested; or

your insolvency; or your failure to give us adequate instructions; or

(vii)our being forbidden to act by the National Crime Agency; or

(viii)our reasonable belief that our continuing to represent you may cause damage to the professional or personal reputation of our firm or any of its personnel; or

any other breach by you of these terms.

c. On early termination, by either you or us, you will remain liable to pay all fees and expenses incurred before termination and due under our contract or due on the basis of the time spent at our usual hourly rates, whichever is the less, together with any further fees and expenses for work necessary to transfer our files to another adviser of your choice. All our rights set out in these terms shall continue to apply even if we terminate the agreement.

16. Money Laundering Regulations / The Proceeds of Crime Act 2002

(a) In accordance with the requirements of the Data Protection Act and the Money Laundering Regulations, we confirm:

(i) Robsons Legal is the data controller

(ii) Joanna Robson is the nominated representative/ data protection officer

(b) We will only process any documentation or personal data received from you in respect of client due diligence for the purposes of preventing money laundering and terrorist financing unless (a) use of that data is permitted by or under any enactment or (b) you give your express consent for the documentation or personal data to be used for other forms of processing.

(c) We are required to comply with the Money Laundering Regulations and in particular to verify the identity and permanent address of all new clients.

(d) You are requested to supply to your solicitor one of the following;

(i) One item from List A and One item from List B.

Please note we require certified copies if you are sending these by post

LIST A – Proof of Identity

Current fully signed Passport

Current full UK Photocard Driving Licence.

LIST B – Address Verification

A bill for the supply of electricity, gas, water or telephone services (provided it is fewer than three (3) months old). Mobile phone bills are not acceptable.

Television Licence renewal notice.

Council Tax bill (provided it is fewer than three (3) months old).

Recent Mortgage Statement.

Credit Card/Bank Statement

provided it is fewer than three (3) months old) showing current address.

(e) If you are a new or existing body corporate client not listed on a regulated market who has not previously supplied information, we will require the following:

Company / organisation full name;

Company or other registration number;

Registered address and, if different, principal place of business address;

Memorandum of association or other governing documents;

Names of the Board of Directors or members of your management body and its senior management;

Documentation in accordance with lists A and B above for any beneficial owners.

(f) If we have acted as your Solicitor in the last twelve months you should not supply the above unless you are specifically requested to do so.

(g) In order to comply with the Law relating to Data Protection we will not retain a copy of your documents for a period longer than is necessary. Our usual policy is to inspect and record a reference number of your documents and any expiry date on your client file and to return any original documents to you.

(h) Under the Money Laundering Regulations (as amended) we are obliged to inform Companies House of any discrepancy between the information that we hold about a beneficial owner of a company, limited liability partnership or Scottish Limited or qualifying partnership and the information that is on the public record of people with significant control (PSC) register. Our obligation to make such notification will, in certain circumstances, override our duty of solicitor/client confidentiality and we may not be permitted to inform you whether or not we have made, or might intend to make, such notification.

(i) Under the provisions of the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 ("POCA"), we may be required to make a report to the relevant authorities if at any time we become aware of or suspect (whether from you or any other person) the existence of the proceeds of crime in relation to any Services on which we are engaged. Our obligation to make such a report will, in certain circumstances, override our duty of solicitor/client confidentiality and we may not be permitted to inform you whether or not we have made, or might intend to make, such a report.

(j) We may terminate the provision of any Services to you, or be instructed to do so by the relevant authorities, if you fail to comply with your obligation to provide evidence of identity or we suspect that you or any other party connected with you or with the Matter is involved in activities proscribed by POCA.

17. Severability

(a) Each of these terms shall be severable and distinct from the others and if any term is held to be illegal, invalid or unenforceable, in whole or in part, the remaining terms shall not be affected.

18. Equality and Diversity

(a) We will not discriminate in the way we provide our Services on the grounds of age, disability, gender re- assignment, marriage and civil partnerships, pregnancy and maternity, race (including colour, nationality (including citizenship) ethnic or national origins), religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation.

19. Financial Services

(a) If during the course of the matter upon which we are advising you, you need advice on investments, we may have to refer you to someone who is authorized by the Financial Conduct Authority, as we are not.

20. Complaints Procedure

(a) If you have any problem with the services we have provided for you, then please let us know. We will try to resolve any problem between ourselves. If for any reason we are unable to resolve the problem between us, then we are regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority and complaints and redress mechanisms are provided through the Solicitors Regulation Authority and the Legal Ombudsman. A copy of our full complaints procedure is available on request.

(b) The Law Society is a designated professional body for the purposes of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000, but responsibility for regulation and complaints handling has been separated from the Law Society’s representative functions. The Solicitors Regulation Authority is the independent regulatory body of the Law Society and the Legal Ombudsman is the independent and impartial complaints handling body established by the Legal Services Act 2007.

Raise any complaint first with the Fee Earner assigned to your matter, including any complaint about your bill. If this does not resolve it satisfactorily, tell the Supervising Partner responsible for your case.

If this does not resolve it satisfactorily, contact Joanna Robson principal solicitor to ensure prompt and thorough investigation of any complaint.

If still unresolved at this stage, you may take your complaint to the Legal Ombudsman. Normally, you will have to bring your complaint to the Legal Ombudsman within 6 months of receiving a final response from us about your complaint and 6 years from the date of the act or omission giving rise to the complaint or alternatively 3 years from the date you should reasonably have known there are grounds for complaint (if the act/omission took place before 6 October 2010 or was more than 6 years ago).

The address of the Legal Ombudsman is: PO Box 6806, Wolverhampton, WV1 9WJ; telephone, 0300 555 0333 or view their website at www.legalombudsman.org.uk or email enquiries to: enquiries@legalombudsman.org.uk

(d) A complaint to the Legal Ombudsman can only be made by one of the following:

An individual;

A micro- enterprise as defined in European Recommendation 2003/361/EC of 6 May 2003 (broadly, an enterprise with fewer than 10 staff and turnover or balance sheet value not exceeding 2 million Euros;

A charity with an annual income less than £1 million;

A club, association or society with an annual income less than £1million;

A trustee of a trust with a net asset value less than £1million; or a personal representative or the residuary beneficiaries of an estate where a person with a complaint died before referring it to the Legal Ombudsman.

(e) If you do not fall into one of these categories, you should be aware that you can only obtain redress by using our Complaints Handling Procedure or by mediation or arbitration , or by taking action through the courts. You also have the right to object to your bill by making a complaint to the appropriate body referred to above and/or by applying to the Court for an assessment of the bill under Part III of the Solicitors' Act 1974 and, if all or part of our bill remains unpaid, we may be entitled to charge interest.

21. LAW AND JURISDICTION

(a) The terms on which we provide Services to you are governed by, and shall be construed in accordance with, English law. You and we each agree to submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the English courts, provided that we may in our sole and unfettered discretion commence proceedings against you in any other Court.

22. DISCLAIMER

(a) We are not qualified to advise you on the tax implications of transactions you instruct us to carry out, or the likelihood of them arising.

(b) We are committed to promoting compliance with the requirements of the Criminal Finances Act 2017 within our practices as well as in those areas in which we have influence.

(c) We do not tolerate tax evasion, or the facilitation thereof in any circumstances, whether committed by or facilitated by a client, personnel or associated persons/companies.

(d) We shall not be liable for any loss, damage, cost or expense arising from any breach by you of your agreement with us or any act or omission of any other person; or any advice or document subject to the laws of a jurisdiction outside England and Wales; or any advice or opinion given to you by any third party (whether or not nominated or recommended by us).

23. PROVISIONS RELATING TO LITIGATION AND OTHER WORK IN RELATION TO DISPUTES

(a) This paragraph contains further contractual provisions and important information which we are professionally obliged to give you where your matter relates to litigation or the resolution of disputes by other means (including a non-contentious Matter which becomes contentious, or gives rise to further instructions on a contentious Matter).

(b) In some litigation matters, the Court may decide to order one party to pay the costs of the other. The Court usually orders the unsuccessful party to pay all or a part of the successful party’s costs, although there is no certainty about this. The successful party usually recovers a proportion of its costs from the unsuccessful party, although there is no certainty about this. However, costs in the Tribunal are rare. You should be aware that:-

If you do not succeed, you may have to pay the other side’s costs, usually within two (2) weeks. Costs awarded have to be proportionate to the value of the dispute and, in the ordinary course, recovered costs are assessed on the following factors
- efforts made before and during the proceedings to try to resolve the dispute, including the appropriate use of mediation and other alternative
- the complexity and size of the Matter and the difficulty or novelty of the questions raised;
- the skill, effort, specialised knowledge and responsibility involved;
- the time spent;
- the place and Circumstances in which the work was done.

(c) The other side’s costs rarely exceeds sixty per cent (60%) of actual expenditure and you will still be liable to pay our costs in full, even if the other party fails to pay the costs awarded to you by the Court.

Statements of Truth

(d) All statements of case (the term for pleadings which includes documents such as claim forms, defences and witness statements) and certain other documents, must be verified by a statement of truth, to the effect that the party putting forward the document believes the facts stated in it are true. Making a false statement of truth is potentially a contempt of Court. Whilst a statement of truth can be signed by you or your legal representative, it is our policy that you should sign your own Statement of Truth.

Attendance at Hearings

(e) Please be aware that, the Court or Tribunal can order you to attend hearings. We will discuss this with you further as your case progresses.

Alternative Dispute Resolution and ACAS

(f) As part of the active management of a case before an Employment Tribunal, early conciliation is mandatory before a claim can be issued. In addition, where parties remain in dispute after the claim has been issued, it is encouraged to continue with the conciliation process via ACAS and to promote settlement of the claims wherever possible.

Settlement Agreements

(g) You may agree to enter into a Settlement Agreement which is an irrevocable binding legal document imposing terms on all parties to the Agreement. This will bring an end to the dispute and bar either party from bringing any further proceedings against the other. It will also extinguish any claims which either party may have had against the other.

24. INSURANCE

(a) We have a legal duty to tell you about our professional indemnity insurance. We have an obligation to carry such insurance and our qualifying insurers are Travelers Insurance PLC. Our insurance policy number is UCSOL3890511. The insurance covers our practice carried on from our offices in England and Wales

25. ACCEPTANCE OF THESE TERMS OF BUSINESS

(a) Your continuing instructions in this matter will amount to acceptance of these terms and conditions. However, your signing of a copy of our client care letter referring to these terms of business constitute your written acceptance of the same.

26. REGULATORY INFORMATION

(a) We are a firm of solicitors on the roll at the Solicitors Regulation Authority. Our SRA number is 488570.

(b) Joanna Robson is a sole practitioner and works under her own account at the SRA.

Last updated August 2022