The Solicitors Regulation Authority has moved in to formally shut down a firm which closed its doors last week. BLB Solicitors, which had six offices in the west of England, was placed into administration on Thursday and its staff made redundant.
The SRA revealed yesterday it had carried out an intervention into BLB after the firm was made subject to an insolvency event.
The regulator does not intervene into every firm that goes into administration but can do so to protect client interests, although there is no suggestion of wrongdoing in this case.
Gareth Buckley and Steve Elliott from a business called The Insolvency Company have been appointed as joint administrators.
The reason for the abrupt closure is still unclear, although it has been reported by The Negotiator trade publication that it was due to an anticipated sale of the business collapsing at short notice.
The firm, which had 89 staff as of last March, operated from sites in Wiltshire and Gloucestershire and offered a range of personal and business legal services.
The BLB intervention is another issue for the SRA to deal with on top of three interventions for various reasons in the space of a week and the potentially costly closure earlier this year of PM Law and its various trading names.
Meanwhile, a Manchester wealth management business which also provided legal services under SRA regulation has entered administration. LCM Family Limited had been authorised as an alternative business structure since 2016 but is now closing, with administrators appointed from BTG Begbies Traynor.
The firm had agreed a voluntary requirement with the Financial Conduct Authority last month to restrict the activities it could undertake.
