Family and Friends Forum

Hi, we have paid as we go along. Roughly at the moment we are about £3,500. If you aren't happy with something on an invoice then please query it we did this recently and they took £350 off it. Hope you are doing ok.

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My OH is about to have second interview, have got specialist solicitor who has set fee of £3k until charges.



not sure about fees after that but have braced self for at least same again.

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We have been quoted "6000" plus vat up to charge and the same again up to sentence so approx £15000 in total, they dont do legal aid work even though my son would probably qualify. I have been looking at other options but I dont know where to get impartial recommendations for legal aid solicitors in my area

Just reading this has scared me. Does this mean that my son won't be getting very good representation if he is getting legal aid?

We changed from the duty solicitor after charges were brought as he gave us poor advice and felt he wasn't doing his best.

We then had to pay £400 for the new firm to represent us at magistrates and got legal aid for crown.

the firm we moved to was amazing and went above and beyond for us, they did their absolute best and got us the best possible result.

I do believe you have to find representation that is the right fit, if your person has learning difficulties or something that warrants a private specialist firm.

but if not, this crime is so common that every firm is a specialist in this area. You don't need to pay thousands to get good representation-legal aid pays them.

also legal aid for crown is means tested, we had to do payment contributions and had to pay about £6k back to them-we got £4k of this back after legal aid finalised the bill as our case didn't cost that much.

Legal aid paid for a specialist risk assessment for my oh as well.

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Everything GZ said is same as ours. My oh had a duty solicitor basically told him to come clean and agree to everything which incriminated him more before they never found what he came clean to. We changed company was £300 for their representation. Really good company we got anything else free because we luckily just scrape into universal credit. It's worth looking if you qualify for any benefits because it helps loads with magistrates and crown court costs

I apologise in advance if it is not allowed but if anyone has can personally recomend solicitors who accept legal aid in the north west I would really appreciate it.

Hi BettyBoo,

I would certainly ring around for comparisons. We also went with a specialist and were told costs were only applicable once charges were received. Our solicitor said they can't really do any work until then but it seems they all work differently. I wonder what the pre-charge work includes? Luckily, ours went NFA but we haven't paid a penny to the solictor despite him requesting case updates. x

we choose a solicitor that specialises in this area. We had the Knock nearly two years ago but my husband only just had his first court appearance recently. If we go into see them in person then for an hour for a meeting it's nearly £400. Also as well if they send an email to do with my husbands case it's £40 per email. Also as well the court appearance may only be a short time but we are charged a minimum of four hours. We knew all this before signing up with them but they are best where we live. It's a lot to take in and think about. Hope you find someone.

I do find it odd that a solicitor says they can't do any work, until charges are brought. One thing a solicitor can do is negotiate with the CPS, to try and make sure that no charges are brought in the first place.

Also, when these quotes are being given, is that based on an assumption that the person is going to plead not guilty and go to trial, or are they quotes for a guilty plea? A guilty plea should not cost £15,000, but a not guilty might do, because it's a lot more work.