Getting the best value from your Dispute Resolution solicitor

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When you’re involved in a dispute,your business will benefit enormously from the advice of an experienced dispute resolution solicitor who has seen disputes of that kind before and who is very familiar with the process.Businesses are keen to avoid cost and there is no doubt that professional services are costly.Here are some suggestions for maximising the value you receive.

Early involvement

It is important to get things right from the outset. It will likely cost more if you bring us in to a case that is already well-advanced and we have to start undoing things so that we can do them again, correctly than if we were involved from the outset.

That involves carrying out the proper pre-action correspondence to put you in the best position on costs, and making sure that when you do issue you have all your papers suitably prepared.

We need the full story to see the ‘big picture’

To advise you properly and help you get the best possible outcome, we really need to see the full picture – the bad bits as well as the good ones.We sometimes have clients present us with their own version of the case and who resist our attempts to ‘look behind’ that sanitised version.In those cases, the clients are wasting their money on lawyers and may as well represent themselves. But they can also be sure that a judge will ask the same questions the solicitors did.It is always better to get ahead of any potentially harmful issue by talking it through with your solicitors so that they are fully prepared to deal with it when it arises (and it will!).

Compact your instructions

While our first goal is always to make sure that clients are happy, the only thing that solicitors have to sell is their time. There no need to buy more of it than you need. If you can call your solicitor once to talk about two different things instead of making two separate calls as those same two things occur to you it will likely cost less.

Keep records of important transactions

The moment you embark on any course of action, have half your mind on evidence. You’ve struck a gentleman’s agreement? Send an e-mail confirming the terms of that deal. Think someone is going to make a complaint? Have detailed notes of what has happened and when. Then, should things go wrong, you can pull out a file of evidence that is going to make the preparation of a detailed witness statement a very simple task.

For specific Dispute Resolution advice, please contact John Wiblin.

Please note the contents of this blog are given for information only and must not be relied upon. Legal advice should always be sought in relation to specific circumstances.