A new guidance outlining recommendations on what should and should not be included in pre-contract enquiries is to be published.
The document has been produced by Vicki Redman of Swiitch (working with other conveyancers from other firms) in response to an increase in what is described as ‘wholly inappropriate’ enquiries.
66% of respondents to the latest Today’s Conveyancer survey responded to say they felt the number of enquiries they had received over the last 12 months on average per matter has increased; over half (57%) said the relevance of enquiries has decreased.
The guidance will take a ‘practical’ approach aiming to reduce the number of enquiries that are not relevant and will divide enquiries into two distinct categories:
- Category A enquiries are those that should not be raised on any standard residential conveyancing transaction, where the Law Society Conveyancing Protocol and/or the Conveyancing Association Technical Protocol is being used.
- Category B enquiries are those that should be avoided on most standard residential conveyancing transactions, where the Law Society Conveyancing Protocol and/or the Conveyancing Association Technical Protocol is being used.
Bold Legal Group founder and CEO Rob Hailstone says:
“One of the biggest bugbears and time delays for conveyancers at the moment is the increasing number, of often unnecessary enquiries, being raised by some conveyancers when acting for property buyers. This guidance document will hopefully help clarify when certain enquiries need raising and when they don’t. It helpfully contains explanatory notes as to why certain enquiries should not be raised. “
The document will be released at the upcoming Bold Legal Group Conference in London on 11th June and will be subject to continued refinement once published
3 responses
Hopefully this will be a useful tool.
Will it be endorsed by The Law Society and CLC?
That is the plan, once it has been looked at by the profession generally.
Potentially still it will not be implemented by the tech bots who still want their boxes ticking and prefer to use artificial intelligence rather than organic intelligence which (hopefully) should have more thinking capacity.