Abbey panel consolidation – update
Friday 27 March 2009 by a Gazette reporter
Abbey has declined to reinstate 542 law firm offices removed from its conveyancing panel but will be writing today (27 March) to all those affected by the consolidation exercise. All will have an opportunity to reapply to join a panel consolidating Abbey’s panel members with those of Alliance & Leicester, which Abbey took over last year.
As the Gazette reported yesterday, some 319 firm offices which had ongoing instructions, or instructions in the pipeline, were reinstated to the panel by close of business on Monday this week, with a further 75 set to follow.
In a letter to the profession yesterday, Law Society President Paul Marsh updated solicitors on Chancery Lane’s negotiations with the bank. The Society will shortly provide Abbey with a detailed commentary on the practical implications it thinks arise from the decision to remove 6,050 firms or branch offices from the existing panels of Abbey and Alliance & Leicester, which together comprised some 28,000 offices.
‘It was confirmed to us that Abbey’s staff will be instructed that they cannot tell customers, or give them the impression, that they must change their solicitors,’ he said.
Marsh will report to the profession again following another meeting expected to take place when Abbey has considered that commentary.
Comments
Comments on the Abbey story
You can see the growing number of comments on our Abbey story by going to the original story's page, here.
Abbey Panel
I have been a sole practitioner since 2001. My practice consists of general high street work, including but not limited to, or dependent upon residential conveyancing.
From the outset, I declined to apply for membership of the Abbey panel because I regarded the three page standard undertaking which was required as prejuducial to the interests of the buyer for whom I was also acting. It has not cost me a great deal in lost business.
I have since handled purchases in association with another local firm who have been on the Abbey panel, as separate representation seemed to be the only solution. That other, highly respected, local firm is now one of those removed from the Abbey Panel.
Abbey introduced their terms for panel membership at a time when work was very limited during an earlier property crash, and their ability to restrict the independence of the profession in their own interest was greatest. Not enough was done to resist at that time. They seem to be doing it again.
My view always has been that there should be an absolute restriction that prevents a solicitor from acting on behalf of the lender and the borrower, and another one preventing the lender from making the borrower pay its legal costs. They should pay their own legal costs. The idea that there is no conflict of interest between the lender and the borrower is an obvious fiction, and given the present condition of the financial services industry it is one which is completely unwarranted, and prejudicial to the interest of the lay client.
These rules would make panels irrelevant, because lenders would be free to choose whoever they wanted, and so would borrowers.
I suppose we will look at membership of the combined panel, when we know the terms, but on past experience, we may well feel that we must reject that too. Who else will do the same?
RW
Abbey Panel
To some extent the solicitor's firms only have themselves to blame. Joining a panel is an easy way to avoid marketing your firm but at when it comes to the (credit) crunch this action by Abbey just goes to prove that the easy option is not always the best option. I started CompareConveyancing.com some 12 months ago with the intention of taking the conveyancing industry back from the big players and estate agents and into the hands of the high street firm. I have already seen off competitition from the Yorkshire Building Society. Unfortunately though sometimes trying to make solicitors firms see the harm that their lack of marketing causes them long term is frustrating, so whilst I am sorry for the inevitable consequebnces that this will cause I cant help feeling that firms could have done more to protect themselves. After all it's your business so why rely on someone else to bring work in?