You should give careful thought to the scope of your engagement. It should briefly, but accurately describe the services to be delivered and set out the expectations on both sides of the agreement. There is an important balance to be struck in setting out the scope. A wide scope and you risk being liable to advise on matters that you thought were out of scope. A wide scope also makes it harder for you to terminate if things break down as it removes from you the argument that you have completed the retainer and thus do not have to accept further work. However, a narrow scope can lead to you taking on personal liability if you have done work you were not instructed to do (known as breach of warranty of authority). The solution therefore is to have a narrow scope and to review it periodically to ensure it always records what you are doing, but no more.
A new Engagement Letter will be required if:
On occasion, and particularly in employment matters, a third party may be nominated to pay our fees. If so, simply inform Central Office once you are yourself made aware. The Risk Questionnaire asks this as part of a new matter set-up. If this comes to light later, then you should advise invoicing@keystonelaw.co.uk. Unless the matter is high risk, we need only the name and address of any third-party payer. (Colleagues in the Isle of Man will need to identify and verify the third-party payer and establish the source of the payer's funds.)
It should be noted that even where an Invoice is marked as payable by a third party, the client retains primary responsibility for payment and, further, any third-party payer may not be able to reclaim the VAT and cannot be the addressee of our invoices. If this is a problem and where the work has genuinely been carried out for the third party, then the solution is that the third party becomes a client of the firm in the normal way. Please bear in mind that you will then owe a duty of care to both clients. For further details, see the section on third party payers.
As matters evolve and develop, we must ensure the client's expectations remain well managed, particularly in so far as timescales and costs are concerned. The most common complaint to the Legal Ombudsman is regarding the failure to keep the client informed of costs. So it is very important that expectations are managed from the outset and throughout the retainer. If you are not to undertake the further work, then you should make this clear in writing and be mindful of your duty to warn the client of material legal points the client should be considering in declining to instruct us (click here for the training notes on the duty to warn). If you are to undertake the work, then you should record the extended scope in writing and copy that to the Clients Team, as this amounts to a change in the terms of our contract with our client. A simple email is sufficient but it is important to do so.