Lawyer taking money doing nothing

I have just confimed with Patricia you are being assisted. She is sending to you an email today. I do hope and wish you can say better things about us now :)

Cheers!

Best wishes,

Maria

Congratulations Sam on deciding to 'Stop Smoking'. It's been about seven years since I stopped and I know how difficult it can be and how irritable you can become.

 I found that replacing stimulant type drinks such as tea, coffee and alcohol with water helped. Also whenever the craving for a cigarette came over me I would   drink lots of water or clean out a cupboard or drawer. Do something, just to distractt me until the feeling passed.

Now, like many ex-smokers, I cannot stand the smell of cigarette smoke .

 Stick with it, the financial benefits are huge these days with the price of cigarettes but more important are the benefits to your health.

edited to enlarge the font
 

maria, after recieving patricias emails today, I will continue to give further updates whether good or bad on the service you provide, is that not fair?, lets see what time will tell, I also sincerely wish I will be able to say better things about your firm,  as I have not had contact with you since my initial conversation, I can apreciate thats how firms work, but maybe explains how you were unaware of lack of communications, yours sincerely  mark samuel hewitt  (sam)

Dear Sam:

With all my respect and willing to reach an understanding between we both.

Through a very qualified member on my team and lawyer ( Patricia) we have been providing a quality service to you for months now. The fact developers do not want to settle out of courts ( which is commun these times in Spain), specially due to the important lack of financial sources they have, does not mean we have not performed our work with full committment and risponsability from day 1.

I undertand the results right now are not what you were expecting, but we always make clear to all our clients, that we cannot assure a success and less even in the out of court stage.

We have proposed a new action to you today which I think it is very effective for different reasons: enough precedent Case Law, Law and own results, but even though I cannot assure you a 100% success on this.

I do humbly think we have been and are doing all in our hands and no less that it has been promised to you and I am very hopeful on a good outcome. But again: patience is needed.

Please email me directly if you need further explanations.

Best,

Maria

Ps.- For the rest of the members, my apologies as I do understand this type of discussones is not what you are looking for in the forum. Most sincere apologies

,maria, I agree this should not be discussed on this forum, please feel free to telephone me tomorrow at your convenience to discuss, as ive requested a telephone appointment with you two days ago, yours sam

Ok. Please send an email with your phone number.

For those of you interested.... we also have happy clients :) Forgot to mention that in my last post. If you want to read them, please click here

I believe many Spanish law firms are guilty of taking on too much lucrative litigation work and do not really have the resources to run all these files. I would also go so

A few years ago we saw the same problem with conveyancing expanding rapidly on the back of the property boom with quality and client service going out the window as inexperienced newly qualified lawyers or trainee (pasante) lawyers were given too much responsibility.

A client of a Marbella based law firm said before the property boom he could always meet and speak with his laywer in his dingy upstairs office but then he got busy and he moved to a plush new office and hired lots of new staff with names changing by the week and this good lawyer no longer had time to meet and speak with his old clients and he had no interest in them whatsoever as plane loads of buyers arrived over to buy all those beautiful off-plan properties ........the money just rolled in!

In some respects this new wave of litigation is the direct consequence of these failing lawyers and the poor contracts they drafted or negotiated and for which they took fat fees at the time!!

Mr Hewitt has every right to ask what was done for his EUR1,500 and in my opinion if all you managed to do was send a Burofax to which more than likely the developer did not respond then you have overcharged if no direct negotiations took place with the developer to achieve any out of court settlement?

Also I believe Mr Hewitt is entitled to receive a copy of the Burofax and also to ask for a time/activity ledger with narrative etc. Does the baremo (scale fees) not apply? Any decent lawyer would have no hesitation in providing this information to a client if the work was indeed done. Also I think if a new lawyer was appointed then under the venia you would have to produce/release certain information?

To me this is an interesting topic as I am always looking to see if expats are being treated fairly and getting value for money particularly from their appointed Spanish laywer. Lawyers are always willing to meet potential clients so why ignore them or fob them off on junior staff once they have been reeled in?

This is a message really for FARO.  I recognise your name from another forum.  Would you be good enough to disclose who you are!!!!  Not that I don't trust the comments on this site but you write like a Lawyer!!!!!

Faro, some good tips and advice and fees etc, just what this forum needs and if you are a lawyer I think you will be a good one, not many of them around I'm afraid,  thanks

Faro,

Thank you for your summary of the situation that led up to the mess  that greedy Spanish lawyers created during the Property Boom. Yours is the kind of post that has been sadly lacking on   discussions about  the  quality of service to expect from   your Spanish lawyer.

The average person deals with a lawyer  perhaps three or four times in their life-time. I.E., buying a house, making a will or sorting out the estate of a relative. Litigation for most people is a rarity let alone litigation in a foreign country and language.

After being well and truly shafted by one Spanish lawyer it is no wonder the amount of trust people have in a second one (albeit a recommended one) can only be described as fair. How could you have complete trust? You would be a fool indeed to do so.

 With regard to knowing you have  rights   to view documentation  and to see  receipts as proof for work done during the progression of the case, well that would be news to most people . That's IF they knew what to actually ask for, since the internal mashings of the legal process are a mystery to most. A situation you might say some Spanish solicitors have taken full advantage of.

Could you please explain:-

'a time/activity ledger with narrative etc.' 

and

'the baremo (scale fees) '

Also you state,

'if all you managed to do was send a Burofax to which more than likely the developer did not respond then you have overcharged if no direct negotiations took place with the developer to achieve any out of court settlement'

 Should the lawyer send their client a detailed statement of  the initial action they take i.e., they sent a burofax or had face to face negociations with the developer or whoever?

  Should it include a summary of  the points discussed, offers made (if any)  and  the outcome i.e., no reply, or reached an impasse, and include copies of all documentation ( names and addresses of people contacted, dates and receipts) that supports those actions and details the costs incurred?

 Should this  be sent as a matter of course or only when requested by the client? Is it the clients right to have all this documentation or just  'good practice' for the lawyer to supply it?  Surely a client would be better informed on how to proceed, i.e., spend more money, with this knowledge under his belt?

Finally, when it is determined the case must go to court and a Preliminary Hearing is scheduled, what actually happens? Also at this stage should a good lawyer send their client a detailed statement of the proceedings?

Sorry to be so long winded but now I have a 'Neutral' information source I'm not letting you go. 

P.S. I should also thank Sam for opening up the discussion that led you here.
 

This message was last edited by sandra on 27/01/2010.

sandra, ive just gone through emails regarding questions and answers I recieved, I will say no more at the moment, untill in fairness, I can comment further, but watch this space mate, yours sam

Faro

Is the silence a direct message that you are not willing to disclose who you are#

sorry pressed the send button twice

jilloff,

It might be a sign that she/he's gone to bed,the pub,to watch TV or to make a cup of tea as I'm about to do!

Goodnight all!!

Some simple ideas:

After a Burofax for an out of court settlement is sent, no response by the developer is the most commun answer these days. Phone calls prove also to be useless if there is no will of negotiation. Unfortunately, the most effective pressing measure ( if it results) is to effectively issue a lawsuit. In some occassions the developer react at this moment ( if he considers it and if he can); sometimes he waits till the Preliminary Hearing date is held ( as it is the last moment for settlement with no imposing of legal fees).

In other some cases, they resort to litigation too as they obviously have their own perspective of the situation and there is still no much definitive Case Law in favour of Consumers in many aspects of the off-plan real estate business.

Thanks and yes, let´s keep up the open debate!

Maria

Thanks for your comment. It's also pretty much what I believe the situation to be in these harsh times. But just turn this couple into happy clients. You appear to have many happy clients so just one to convert?

My comments are not aimed at you or your firm, I am more expressing negativity towards Spanish law in general and how the Spanish legal system is viewed in the UK so maybe the heading of this thread should become a separate debate rather than hi-jack this thread on a general debate.

In the Uk we have more openness and honesty and in general lawyers are more trustworthy, that's not to say they are all good. In the UK fees vary but then so does the level of service. So if you choose a cheap no frills service then you can't complain but if you pay top dollar then you expect your lawyer to be available.

The other problem I see is a lack of knowledge and the system procedure and costs need to be more fully explained especially worst case and best case scenarios.

Thanks a lot for your comments Faro. Even when, as you say, not aimed at our LawFirm I heartedly appreciate them as everything we can do to improve the level of trust of foreigners in Spanish Law, Lawyers and System is always a task. Part of the mission of this team.

We ahve certainly experienced that need of knowing buy our clients since we atart to work exclusively for English speaking clients back in 2006. For these reason we created our document of terms and conditions, as named by Sandra, that we call " General Information document" and aslo send both a budget of legal costs and an explanation of the budget in first steps of the procedure.

Along the procedure, we try to keep clients informed at every step with past, present and future events, forecasted approximated dates ( difficult as it is with Court work involved) as soon as they happen together with a periodical report.

It is so much the effort and the energies consumed on this ( 4 people almost concentrated on this) that we decided to create a system similar to the one our Government follows to keep citizens informed on the status of their files. It is an online system, that, hopefully and thanks to our great IT guy will see light in the coming...weeks.

Every idea to improve these services is well welcomed and appreciated.

 Hi Maria

Would you or any other lawyer not consider no win no fee. I know I would be delighted to pay double the normal fee from any monies returned

There is always an initial minimum fee that needs to be covered, specially if  the LawFirm committ to communication and good client´s service.

Our fee scheme is actually in between no win no fee and full fee paid as we charge the initial provision of funds, whish is 5% of the amount claimed ( which can be paid in different instalments) and no more fees till the case is solved, whatever the number of different judicial procedures and appeals are necessary to reach a solution to the client.

So far, the accountant and the financial director are allowing me to do it this way. We cover expenses and still have some benefits this way.

Faro,

 I'm sorry you were unable to answer my queries perhaps,after all, you are not a lawyer but someone with experience of dealing with lawyers.

Anyhow your input was most welcome and did clear the way for Maria to put answers to some queries which   might not have been aired if you had  not posted. Hopefully, her replies  also assured anyone else going through the litigation process. Thank you Maria.

The difficulty  in keeping the client informed must be   huge but I believe Maria and her firm are striving to overcome  problems of language and distance via their use of the internet and telephone conferencing and using  people  with a good command of English . I prefer using the internet because I have a slight hearing problem which makes 'phone conversations difficult. 

Problems not so easily overcome are for the client to understand and appreciate that    law procedures in Spain can be very different to their native Country's way of handling things. Sometimes, when requested, a brief explanation such as Maria gave regarding the Burofax versus 'phone call scenario might be needed to clarify an action, and help to keep clients 'in the loop'. 

Finally, I realised you had answered some of my questions   before I asked them and  I realise  the amounts of detailed information you receive and  personal contact  you can expect  from your lawyer is proportional to the level of fees you are prepared to pay.