The Legal Aid Board (LAB) has begun its work on block contracting civil non-family advice and assistance work (known as 'the civil pilot').

There are separate pilots on criminal duty solicitor work and family mediation services.The civil pilot will examine a number of key aspects of the delivery of legal advice and assistance.

It is not in the interests of the profession, the LAB or clients to rush into one particular model of contracting.

As a result the civil pilot will be a two-stage process.

Around 120 firms in four legal aid areas are expected to participate in the first stage.

Forty-two non-profit agencies are already participating in a parallel pilot.Phase one will involve firms being placed at random into one of three groupings to enable the examination of three different methods of payment.

None of these three methods is a model for the final approach.We need to see the benefits and limitations of each and build on these lessons in structuring phase two.

The profession should also benefit from working with the different approaches prior to phase two.Group 1 firms will have the option of being paid a monthly sum based on an initial projection of what they earn from the green form block contract pilot over a year.

This is adjusted (after 9 months) to take into account the number of hours actually worked under the contract.

Firms have some cashflow benefit and do not have to adapt to an overall limit on how much money they are paid in total.

They are to be paid for all contract work at franchise rates and there is a payment on account option.

They will have devolved powers for all their civil non-family work.Group 2 firms will be paid a monthly sum agreed between the LAB an d the firm based on their projected income for advice and assistance over twelve months.

They are then required to carry out advice and assistance in a way that ensures the best overall value, There is no obligation to provide a maximum or minimum amount of work.

Nor will a firm be judged as good or bad on the basis of how much they do, as long as they act in good faith for eligible clients.This has the potential for 'imaginative' block contracting; firms have a cashflow benefit and the flexibility to decide for themselves how best to spend the money.

How much they spend in total will be governed by agreement between the LAB and individual firms.Group 3 firms will be paid a monthly sum agreed between the LAB and the firms, based on their projected income over twelve months.

They will also be expected to carry out a given number of matters for the sum agreed.

This may be a 'firmer' form of block contracting, namely, group 3 have the same cash flow benefits as group 2 but are given clear targets in terms of the number of matters that they should do.

They retain flexibility in terms of how much they may do for each matter and which types of matter they may take on.These are three radically different approaches.

Different aspects are controlled and different aspects are flexible.

The fixing of price (and numbers) of matters is something which will be re-negotiable where a firm's circumstances change significantly.The pilot must be monitored with some caution.

To enable this a new system of reporting has been produced called 'BriefCase'.

It is a new form designed to allow a structured description of each matter outlining the main issues:-- the amount of work done;-- what level of fee earner did what work and;-- how each matter ended.From this basic information we hope to build up a much fuller understanding of each firm's caseload under the contract.Much of the information required under 'BriefCase' is similar to that on the green form block contract pilot, but there is a need to go further.

Concerns, such as those raised by the Law Society in relation to disbursements, make the form a little more detailed than in the past.

There will also be other techniques to check how contracting is working: the LAB will be auditing firms and their files, and the researchers will be monitoring quality of service under contracts through peer review, model clients and client satisfaction surveys.Firms will be understandably concerned about the prospect of competitive tendering.

Under the civil pilot, firms will not be competing against each other.

There will be no bidding on price or volume, and performance under the pilot will not affect decisions about who gets contracts in the future.The pilot will explore whether a move away from green form limits, devolved powers and greater encouragement for representation allows firms to respond more appropriately to the needs of their community.We will be keen to identify how contracting affects clients.

We will also want to see how different financial controls affect firms.

Practitioners in the pilot will see for themselves how a particular approach works and discover its limitations for themselves.