Support grows for regulation of will-writing
A call for evidence on whether will-writing should become a regulated activity has received a huge response from the profession and public, with consumer bodies in favour of regulation.
The Legal Services Board Consumer Panel has received 380 case studies from lawyers, members of the public and others seeking to inform its research into whether the regulation of will-writing would be in the interests of consumers.
The Legal Services Board has tasked the panel with conducting an investigation into the issue, to inform its forthcoming decision on whether or not to regulate the sector.
Responses to the evidence call revealed strong support for the regulation of will-writing from both the profession and consumer bodies.
The Law Society provided 120 case studies in support of its submission that will-writing should become a reserved activity. It said all will-writers should not need to have the same qualifications as solicitors, but any regulatory regime should have: minimum training requirements; compulsory insurance cover; a compulsory compensation fund; a code of conduct; a complaints management system; and a robust disciplinary mechanism.
Consumer organisations Citizens Advice and the National Consumer Federation both said that will-writing should become a reserved activity. Citizens Advice said the LSB should license professional bodies to police members’ activities, with relevant qualifications required as a pre-condition to practising.
Charitable organisation Remember a Charity said a survey of 140 charities had indicated overwhelming support for regulation, and this should provide consumers with a similar degree of protection to that available for solicitors’ work.
The Trades Union Congress also supported making will-writing a reserved activity, with a code of practice which, if breached, should incur financial penalties.
However, the Office of Fair Trading said that it did not currently consider that enough evidence of consumer detriment existed to justify regulating non-lawyer will-writers. The British Bankers Association suggested that any new regulation should not apply to banks, as complaints against them may already be referred to the Financial Ombudsman Service.
Co-operative Legal Services said in its submission that will-writing should become a reserved activity that may only be carried out by solicitors, as the profession offers a 'clear course of redress’. However, the Co-op acknowledged that 'not all solicitors are competent will-writers’, and included examples of poor work by both solicitors and will-writers in its submission.
Comments
Regulation of Will Writers - not such a good idea?
I doubt if the regulation of will writers stands to improve the lot of solicitors at all. One of the major beefs about non-solicitor will writers will have gone and the regulated will writers (e.g. the IPW members if included) will have had a major boost and will be competing on price whilst having having the official imprimatur.
I think this campaign will probably end up as an own goal for solicitors.
It may happen yet but probably not if it costs the Government any money.
Regulation of Will Writing
I suspect that all regulation will achieve is to give credibility to persons who are not Solicitors and allow them to compete with Solicitors on an uneven and less regulated playing field.
Why do we not sing the praises of Solicitors doing Wills on the "Why would you want anyone else to prepare your Will?" basis.
At the same time we should ask ourselves the same question. Most firms prepare Wills as a "Loss Leader" so why do people go elsewhere?
I believe that there are too many encouragements to complain about Solicitors and not enough stories about the benefits of using us. The fact that we are regulated is probably not going to remain a unique selling feature and may never have been of great interest to the Public.
This isn't about solicitors.....
As far as I am concerned regulation is about protection of the public. Yes it may affect my fee income by giving a boost in profile to will writers but then I will just have to alter my marketing/business strategy accordingly, I can roll with the punches just so long as I don't get another telephone call on a monday morning with a distraught family member learning that a Will writer has appointed themselves executor, they haven't done much in the past three months and their fees border on the extortionate.
Death is stressful enough without cowboys (thankfully a minority of Will writers) preying on the vulnerable. The Law Society is backing reform which is in the interests of the population and should be applauded.
Common sense policies please.
The powers that be should decide whether they want to reduce legal costs for the general public by allowing unregulated anyone to do legal work more usually associated with solicitors or restrict legal services to qualified lawyers.Having it both ways creates unfairness and inconsistency in the delivery of legal services. You might be lucky and have an excellent service from an unqualified person and the company that offered the service may be well run but in common sense terms you are more likely to get a better service from a properly trained lawyer who is protected by professional indemnity insurance and is subject to rules of practice.
Creating an oversupply of labor by flooding the market with legally qualified people knowing full well that such people will be competing for jobs and eventually running law practices competing against unqualifed people and unregulated legal businessess (usually Limited Companies) who will work for much less is a very cruel and ruthless policy indeed. It is also a waste of money that could have been better used, Potential entrepreneurs could have been setting up businesses with the money they have wasted on legal education.
The way forward in respect of wills and other legal services is as follows:-
1. Only legal firms regulated by one of the approved regulators may offer legal services to the general public irrespective of whether the legal service is a reserved or unreserved activity as defined by the recent Legal Services Act. There should be new legislation to provide a wide definition of "legal services". This would mean that unqualfied staff selected by lawyers could draft wills in regulated firms but it would be the firms responsibility to ensure that the people actually drafting the wills are supervised. The public would be better protected and the service could be fairly priced.
2. A fair and realistic assessment should be made as to how many legal jobs there are likely to in the future and if, as I suspect, there is a massive over-supply of would be lawyers then statutory intervention should be considered to place a cap on the amount of places being made available on legal courses at various colleges and universities. The principle of restricting numbers should be accepted even if it just means 10 less places at every law school. If the vet schools started to offer hundreds of extra places at vet schools there would be an out cry as everyone knows it is extremely hard to get a place at vet school because there are very few vet jobs - why should the law be any different?
Solicitor run firms ONLY to do legal services
Solicitor runs firms should be the only ones allowed to provide legal services, as other providers erode the quality of the service, vastly increase PII cover for solicitors for sure, and dumb down the UK service industry (after we have sold most of the manufacturing side).
Solicitors are the most widely trained after all. Fine let them employ others like Legal Execs and LIcensed conveyancers, but there has to be a minimum standard - and rid us of the builk providers and middlemen claims people who are just parasites.
Not a Monopoly, just get people properly trained for goodness sake. Law for Lawyers - der!
Come on Government and the Law Society, sort it out!
Grow up! The Government does
Grow up! The Government does not want an independent legal profession, and the Law Society is utterly useless having given its powers to the SRA.
Professional judgement is not wanted-just untrained box-tickers who would comply with any rule whatsoever no matter how horrendous.