I thought solicitors didn''t give credit??

Just got my ex''s financial disclosure through shortly prior to FDR and see that he has paid about £2,000 of legal bills but the lawyer says they have about £6,000 still outstanding.

My ex hasn''t got a big income so I''m stunned that his solicitor has allowed him to run up a bill this size, and we''re only at FDR stage. I assume he (the solicitor) must think that my ex is going to get a big settlement and so he will get paid from that? That''s the only reason I can think of why he would give so much credit.

I was told by all the solicitors I saw that they wanted payment as you go.

Has anyone any experience of this situation? If the solicitor is on risk in this way will they be charging an uplift on their standard fee rate?

Thanks very much all.

They don''t offer credit in the traditional way, but arrangements can be made to pay later, or even sign credit agreement with a bank so if the client doesn''t pay the sol gets paid by the bank and client owes the bank.

Whatever arrangement your ex has with his solicitor is between your ex and his solicitor.

Legal firms operate in difference ways and different people in different firms act in different ways.

In personal injury cases, the whole case is very often funded by the solicitor throughout with a bill being raised at the end only if the case is won ("no win, no fee"). That is a form of credit.

Is the solicitor at risk of not being paid? Absolutely. Is it a poor business model to take on client that might not be able to pay their bills? Yes siree. Is that any of your business? It is as much your business as it is mine.

If you look at the Form H and Form H1 costs estimates, there is a total box and a box showing what contributions have been made. The point of those boxes is to allow the judge to work out what fees are owing so that any final order made can take into account the outstanding costs. There would be no point in the court assessing a person to require £200k to rehouse themselves and the parties'' children if out of the £200k they had to pay £20k in outstanding fees. The court would make the assessment, add on the outstanding fees and order that £220k be paid.

That is a simplistic analogy based on a ''needs-based case'' but in essence the outstanding costs are treated as any other liability at the end of the day.

Charles

Thank you very much both for your help.

Charles, I see what you say about it being none of my business, but the second part of your answer explains why I think it is my business. When the judge is working out how to split the pot then if my pot is smaller because it has to pay for costs incurred by my ex then it certainly is my business, I think.

He can''t afford expensive legal fees and yet he is running them up on credit and I will end up paying part of them when I''m doing all I can to keep costs down.

It seems unfair that my ex can run up liabilities after our separation and they end up coming out of my share.

There is a safety net here, Charles mentioned form h1, a form used to alert a judge to costs to a final hearing. The judge can apportion costs if he/she thinks they are excessive unreasonable, but it''s fairly rare, the long and the short of it is that those who end up in court will waste an awfull lot of cash.

The difficulty is that there is only one matrimonial pot and until it is split any legal fees can only come from one place - the joint pot.

If one person chooses to represent themselves, this allows them to save money but potentially also saves their estranged spouse some money too. Conversely, if one person decides to instruct a legal team this will cost both parties money.

There are exceptions to the rule and one of those is where there are limited assets which cannot adequately provide for both parties. In this case, the party with the greatest need often gets an unfair share of the pot regardless of other issues.

The other issue is that of open offers. If one party makes an open offer after disclosure has taken place and that offer is rejected, the rejection will be seen as unreasonable. In those circumstances the party who rejects the reasonable offer can end up paying the costs from the date the offer was made.

In this instance this would also mean bearing their own costs from the date of the offer i.e. costs would come out of the pot up to the date of the offer and the costs after that date would be ring-fenced.

The court would ignore the ring-fenced costs for the purposes of calculating the settlement thus leaving the unreasonable party with their settlement PLUS a liability for costs rather than their settlement which includes a sum to reflect their outstanding costs.

There are a lot of factors to consider which is why there are no hard and fast rules. Rather than consider the other side''s use of a legal team as unnecessary it is better to consider that by representing yourself you are minimising the drain on the joint matrimonial pot.

The alternative is trying to advance an argument that the other side should be barred from instructing a legal team as you are not using one. Perhaps your spouse is weak of will or of mind and the only way to achieve equality of arms is to instruct somebody to act in his place? Interfering with this decision leads to all sorts of problems.

Charles

The alternative is trying to advance an argument that the other side should be barred from instructing a legal team as you are not using one. Perhaps your spouse is weak of will or of mind and the only way to achieve equality of arms is to instruct somebody to act in his place? Interfering with this decision leads to all sorts of plesroblems.

This is an interesting point. I didn''t think it is possible to bar the other side from instructing a legal team. I am in the position that my stbx has been instructed(by his solicitor) not to talk to me and is hiding assets. He is running up huge bills as every communication has to go through his solicitor. I have consequently decided to represent myself. What can I do to stop this?

From what you are saying the process of barring is rare and complicated. Could you elaborate on how you go about barring and the problems that might be faced in the process?