How and when you pay
One page, three answers: paid in advance, invoiced within 14 days, or free. No account forms, no credit arrangements and no chasing letters.
Paid in advance
- Small claims work
- Litigation second opinions
- Any fee we have quoted
Payment is made before any work is carried out. We don’t start the work, and we don’t run an account for it. Once the fee is quoted and the instruction accepted in writing, we ask for the fee.
Negotiable — ordinarily 14 days
- Leasehold and property work
- Company and commercial work
The payment arrangement is agreed in writing with the quotation. Unless we agree something different, the invoice is payable within 14 days of the date of the invoice.
Free
- The assessment
- An initial view on your papers
The assessment comes first, and it costs nothing. No charge arises unless you confirm in writing that you want us to go ahead with paid work.
Why small claims and second opinions are paid in advance
Our fees for that work are relatively small. We don’t have the resource to spend on running accounts, sending reminders and chasing payment — and anything spent on that would have to be recovered in the fee.
Paying in advance keeps the price low. It also means the work starts cleanly: the instruction is agreed in writing, the fee is settled, and our time goes on your case rather than on administration.
Once a fee has been quoted, that is the fee. If the work turns out to take longer than we expected, that is our problem, not yours. We only ask for more if the scope genuinely changes — and then only after you have agreed the change in writing.
Leasehold and company & commercial work
Those matters vary too much for a single payment rule to be honest. The payment arrangement is therefore negotiable and is set out in the written quotation, alongside the fee, the basis of charging and any estimate, budget or cap.
Unless we agree something different in writing, the invoice is payable within 14 days. If an invoice under an agreed 14-day arrangement remains unpaid, we may charge interest at the statutory rate and may pause work until it is settled.
What the fee does not include
Court and Tribunal fees, expert fees, Land Registry or search costs, copying, travel outside the agreed area and similar expenses are not included in a fixed price unless the quotation says so in writing. They are ordinarily paid by you directly.
Counsel’s fees are separate. If counsel is proposed, we set out any additional fee for your agreement before you are committed to it. Where you separately engage a regulated firm or another professional, their own terms and fees apply.
We don’t hold client money
No VAT is currently charged on fees
Where this is written down
The payment terms form part of our standard terms, at clause 8 of the terms and conditions. Prices and how they are set are explained in how our prices work.
- —the free assessment is always free, and no chargeable work begins without your written agreement;
- —small claims, second opinions and any quoted fee — paid in advance, before work begins;
- —leasehold and company & commercial — negotiable, ordinarily 14 days from invoice.
Ask what the fee would be
Send the documents that matter and we will tell you whether we can help, what the work would involve and what it would cost — before anything is payable.
Or email us at win@talklegal.net