Private Client

The Law Society has attacked plans to replace witnessing of lasting powers of attorney with electronic signatures and also force solicitors to use a digital portal.

A solicitor “considered herself to be the client” while operating under a lasting power of attorney, sending bills to herself and massively overcharging the elderly client involved.

A solicitor who abused his position as the executor of an estate and stole £275,000 from it to spend on an “excessive lifestyle” has been struck off by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal.

The Legal Services Board has given itself more time to decide on whether to approve a new breed of law firm created by CILEx Regulation and the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants.

Chartered accountants handling probate work are to face compulsory rules on publishing price and service information after their regulator admitted a voluntary approach had not worked.

The government has outlined plans to streamline and digitise lasting powers of attorney, cutting the time needed for registration in most cases from 40 to 14 days.

There are a number of grounds upon which a person might seek to a challenge the will of a loved one. They include circumstances where the specific formalities required when creating a will are not adhered to, or where the person making the will did not have the necessary mental capacity. It might be that the person making the will did not understand or approve its contents or that they were subject to some form of undue influence by another party. One of the less common grounds potentially available to someone wishing to challenge a will is that of fraudulent calumny.

Law firms can make as much money by providing their clients with free wills and charging for additional services than by charging a few hundred pounds for a will.

A “boutique life management service” is aiming to reduce the stress of divorce and bereavement by providing a holistic service including legal and financial advice.

Immigration and civil litigation were the two areas of legal practice hit hardest by the pandemic last year, with private client and family law “insulated” from the impact, new research has found.