Have you checked with the solicitor? Is there a breakdown of costs given, outgoings, professional fees, VAT? Did you ask for an estimate of fees etc upfront?... Can this be right? ...
Not that I am aware of. Have you checked by searching the site for other examples / experiences?... Is there a guideline figure? ...
How did you form that impression, did you discuss costs with the solicitor before allowing him / her to proceed with the work?... I was under the impression that it would be around 1% of the estate, which would be about €12,000...
Have you checked with the solicitor? Is there a breakdown of costs given, outgoings, professional fees, VAT? Did you ask for an estimate of fees etc upfront?
Not that I am aware of. Have you checked by searching the site for other examples / experiences?
How did you form that impression, did you discuss costs with the solicitor before allowing him / her to proceed with the work?
I have now done a search and found another thread suggesting that 2% is standard! That is still higher than I expected, and even at 2% €30,000 is very high.
Hello, first time posting here.
The will was straightforward, only ourselves and a few other family members involved, and it has been completed fairly quickly with myself and my sister as executors. The solicitor sent out the bill for his fees, and we were gobsmacked to find that it was €30,000!
Can this be right? Is there a guideline figure? I was under the impression that it would be around 1% of the estate, which would be about €12,000. I didn't expect €30,000 at all.
Can anyone advise?
Agreed and most solicitors who post here seem to agree that in uncomplicated cases there is probably no need for legal expertise or little demanding work for a solicitor. But, what layperson, who probably only faces an executorship or inheritance once in a lifetime, knows enough to figure out which side of the dividing line between routine and complex their particular case lies?... If there is a comprehensive list of assets less liabilities then surely there is no need for a huge amount of work by a solicitor.
Agreed and most solicitors who post here seem to agree that in uncomplicated cases there is probably no need for legal expertise or little demanding work for a solicitor. But, what layperson, who probably only faces an executorship or inheritance once in a lifetime, knows enough to figure out which side of the dividing line between routine and complex their particular case lies?
Surely that would prohibit simply charging a percentage? As someone pointed out earlier, It may take more work to complete a complicated €200k will than a straightforward €2M one. But the beneficiaries of the €2M will will pay a fortune and the €200k beneficiary gets a smaller one? That suggests to me that the fees are not even related to the work done, never mind whether they are reasonable or not. It is just a standard "piece of the pie" based on how much the solicitor thinks we can afford because he knows what we inherited!1 - A solicitor's professional fee must be reasonable for the work they have done.
To me, (and admittedly I'm no legal eagle), this means that he is legally obliged to inform me of the likely fees before proceeding. It says charges that we WILL incur, not have already incurred so does this not mean that the solicitor should have made me aware of this in advance? This seems to be the same in Trev's case, the solicitor asked for a load of forms etc signed without ever giving any indication of the potential fees. My case, and Trev's, seem to be the same as Sam h. A fairly short amount of work, (maybe not just a day but certainly not anything worthy of a €30k bill) and he made no attempt to tell us that we would face a massive fee, or that we could do much of the work ourselves.2 - When you instruct a solicitor to carry out some work for you, your solicitor is obliged by law to give you information in writing about the legal charges you will incur.
The information you will be given will be as follows: the solicitor’s actual charges, or, where this is not possible or practicable, an estimate of the solicitor’s charges, or, where this is not possible or practicable, the basis on which the solicitor’s charges are to be made.
Good find Clare and I'd love to agree with you, but unfortunately the same document you quote from and link to includes the following -
"How does my solicitor work out my charges?
Your solicitor bases your charges on a number of factors such as:
...
..."
- the value of any transaction that might be involved;
and IMHO the above bullet-point does not seem to preclude the use of a percentage to calculate at least part of the fee...
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