I entirely agree with the comments made by Ray Patterson - it is also not always easy to get a member of staff to go to the place of storage because of time constraints (see [2006] Gazette, 12 January, 15).


Solicitors can only afford a junior member of staff for this purpose who may not have the use of a car, and carrying heavy files can cause gross inconvenience, particularly where public transport is involved.


Clients are demanding at the best of times and I have come across a number of them who get very bad tempered at being informed that it would take a few days to get papers out of storage. As Mr Patterson quite rightly points out, clients do not pay storage charges and the law firm is in fact doing clients a favour when the purpose for the request may be purely for the client's benefit.


For example, a client asked me to obtain a file from storage for the purpose of furnishing details from our financial statement to his accountant. He had simply discarded the statement and did not have sufficient forethought to retain it for tax purposes.


Vipin Adhia, Ilford