Legal News
Solicitors can refer clients to non-independent advisors (8 January 2013)
Date: 08/01/2013
The Law Society has clarified its position on conveyancing solicitors referring clients to non-independent advisors.
In November last it was reported that there was a controversy between the Society and the Solicitors Regulation Authority, after the SRA passed new rules that went soft on referrals.
Following the decision by the SRA to grant conveyancing solicitors the right to refer clients to non-independent advisers, the Law Society issued a statement warning its members to disregard the new rules.
At the time the SRA said that as long as all recommendations were made with the clients best interests in mind, they had no problems with the Law Society statement.
Now the Law Society has said that it would drop its opposition to solicitor members referring clients to non-independent advisers.
They say that they were giving more importance to whether the firm concerned was impartial rather than independent.
Meanwhile last week the Land Registry issued account holder transaction statistics for November. And the figures showed small conveyancers continued to do business and have not vanished as was being feared.
Of the 4562 Land Registry account holders that made applications in November over 2000 of them conducted five applications or less which means 44 percent were relatively small firms.
Whilst many lenders have reduced their panel sizes down to 3000 – 3500 firms, there are clearly many firms that have not pulled out of the market and are conducting conveyancing sales and purchases despite not being on some lender panels.
But it is good news for the consumers because it continues to give them choice and creates a competitive market.
Unfortunately for these 2000 smaller conveyancing firms they could only process about 7% of all transactions in November with the top 10 firms accounting for a larger market share between them. Figures from this time last year have more or less similar to this period.