Contracting with consumers

The Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013 apply to our Engagement Letters.

These Regulations require businesses, such as Keystone contracting with a client who isa consumer (i.e. people contracting in their personal capacities and not as part of their business and not corporate entities) to give such client a two-week cooling-off period. In that time, the client can cancel the contract at no cost. As a result, work will typically not start during that period, given that fees are at risk. However, in almost all cases, the client will want work to start immediately. If so, the client must return to us our Notice to Commence Work (being a notice served on us by the client instructing us to commence work without delay) after which fees are no longer at risk. This is especially important when you need to incur disbursements.

Where our client is a natural person (or where we have more than one client, then for any who are natural persons), our Engagement Letter assembly tool will ask you if you would like the required notices to be added to the Engagement Letter and will populate them accordingly. You will not need to edit these. You should answer €˜yes' to the relevant question when assembling an Engagement Letter if:

• your client is a natural person;
• your client is contracting as a consumer (i.e. not in the course of his/her business); and
• your contract was formed at a location other than your office or a Keystone office (so contracts formed over the telephone/over email or at other premises, all require this notice).

Where these Regulations apply, you should wait to receive the signed Engagement Letter and the signed Notice to Commence Work. It is not advisable to start work for consumers without receipt of the signed Notice to Commence Work as your fees are at risk. Ideally, digital execution should be used.