Make lawyers bid for your custom online (From Hampshire Chronicle)
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Make lawyers bid for your custom online
6:30am Tuesday 31st August 2010 in
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- By Matt Smith » Politics and business reporter
AN eBAY inspired website that could cut the cost of legal advice has been launched by a Hampshire firm.
Bid4fees turns the tables on the traditional way of finding and paying for legal advice by getting lawyers to bid for cases in an online marketplace.
The new website was founded by Hampshire barrister Kevin Cruise and former Brockenhurst College student Lauren Bradley, who put off going to university to become managing director of the fledging business.
They reckon it could save hundreds if not thousands of pounds of the cost of legal advice from dealing with divorce, a house sale or purchase; to buying or selling a business, or drafting a will.
The site could be a boost to independent lawyers, many of whom have been struggling in recent years, despite a boom in fee income for the wider legal sector.
Since it launched without any advertising just a few weeks ago more than 100 cases have been listed in various categories all receiving bids.
More than 2,200 lawyers throughout the UK have registered with the site and licences have been agreed for seven countries Ms Bradley, who came up with the idea while using eBay, said: “Despite the fact that due to online facilities it is no longer necessary to visit your lawyer, we tend to compromise our choices and our pockets by looking no further than the local high street.
“The choices provided by bid4fees mean y o u r instructions are av a i l - able to e v e r y l awye r in the UK and competition for your fees is fierce.”
Mr Cruise added: “The feedback we have received has been astonishing.
Lawyers have been extremely positive and complimentary, providing additional ideas to enhance the site and generally applauding the concept.”
“We like to think that it will somehow democratise the legal services market.”
The site allows anyone to “safely and confidentially” list a legal problem for free and for lawyers to make fixed fee bids for the case.
Before submitting a bid lawyers can use a secure messaging facility to make contact with a potential client to learn more about the case.
Clients are free to choose any bid and bid4fees takes a ten per cent cut of the successful bid price.
The clients are then encouraged to provide a feedback rating about the lawyer they have chosen.
Comments(14)
Avanti2uk
says...
9:27am Tue 31 Aug 10
RadicalEmu
says...
3:14pm Tue 31 Aug 10
.
I won't continue in the vein i was going to.., I might actually need their services afterwards!
Stargazer64
says...
6:57pm Tue 31 Aug 10
RadicalEmu wrote:Used this site last week for my divorce after my friend posted it on Facebook.
I tried this once, kept saying "Reserve not met".
.
I won't continue in the vein i was going to.., I might actually need their services afterwards!
It was great.
Very easy to use, no bells and whistles. The lawyers have to bid a 'fixed fee' so I know there won't be more to pay.
Brilliant idea. Can't believe no one has thought of it before!
Stillness
says...
7:52pm Tue 31 Aug 10
Stargazer64 wrote:Who is going to get a quote to find out if "fixed fee" meens the fee wont change or if it's just a fix?
RadicalEmu wrote:Used this site last week for my divorce after my friend posted it on Facebook.
I tried this once, kept saying "Reserve not met".
.
I won't continue in the vein i was going to.., I might actually need their services afterwards!
It was great.
Very easy to use, no bells and whistles. The lawyers have to bid a 'fixed fee' so I know there won't be more to pay.
Brilliant idea. Can't believe no one has thought of it before!
Stargazer64
says...
11:20pm Tue 31 Aug 10
You also leave feedback, so any lawyers trying it on would be shooting themselves in the foot wouldn't they?
Maybe the owners - they must be reading these comments? - could provide a response?
Stillness
says...
11:46pm Tue 31 Aug 10
Stargazer64 wrote:Very good idea. I, have got a couple of properties to sell so I'd be very interested.
Well, as I said, the fee I accepted from all the bids received is fixed fee. Apparently, that's the whole point of the site. The lawyers asked me lots of questions and vice versa, so there's no chance of any surprising 'extras' :-)
You also leave feedback, so any lawyers trying it on would be shooting themselves in the foot wouldn't they?
Maybe the owners - they must be reading these comments? - could provide a response?
the-bid4fees-team
says...
1:22pm Wed 1 Sep 10
We appreciate that some may view any business regarding lawyers in a cynical manner, after all, legal fees, especially the 'hourly rate' and 'correspondence' costs can sometimes appear to be quite excessive. Hence the creation of bid4fees.com.
Lawyers bidding for your instructions are permitted only to offer a fixed fee quote – inclusive of VAT. They are advised by the site to raise sufficient enquires to ensure the bid takes into account all probable eventualities. After all, they're the professionals and ought to be able to build in a contingency for such events. Obviously, there could be an occasion where something completely unforeseeable by either party arises and this would have to be negotiated between lawyer and client accordingly. As Stargazer64 rightly states, lawyers will indeed shoot themselves in the foot regarding their feedback rating if they don't perform or mess around with charges. It's not worth it.
As for Radicalemu's comments, we don't have “reserve not met” messages...but Ebay does :-)
Hope this is helpful.
Thanks again
The bid4fees Team
Stillness
says...
1:50pm Wed 1 Sep 10
Kerching.
the-bid4fees-team
says...
3:12pm Wed 1 Sep 10
We can see you're still a little unconvinced, but feel your scepticism is misplaced on this occasion.
Hopefully, if you decide to join the bid4fees community and list your case, your experience, as with all other members, will be a positive one.
The bid4fees Team
Stillness
says...
3:45pm Wed 1 Sep 10
the-bid4fees-team wrote:Two commercial properties for sale. Knocked in to one unit. One side owned by me (no mortgage) the other buy my pension fund (SSAS). Again no mortgage. Interested?
Hi Stillness
We can see you're still a little unconvinced, but feel your scepticism is misplaced on this occasion.
Hopefully, if you decide to join the bid4fees community and list your case, your experience, as with all other members, will be a positive one.
The bid4fees Team
RadicalEmu
says...
4:27pm Wed 1 Sep 10
.
Hopefully will never need your services, but a sliding scale's always handy!
Stargazer64
says...
5:10pm Wed 1 Sep 10
Stillness, your concerns about upping the quote worried me and prompted me to contact my new lawyer to check the quote and they were certain there would be no adjustment adding 'that's a rule of the bid4fees site'
...just curious, did you decide to use it after all?
Stillness
says...
5:21pm Wed 1 Sep 10
Stargazer64 wrote:Stillness is still thinking.........It takes a while to do that now days lol.
Seems they were watching! Good for them.
Stillness, your concerns about upping the quote worried me and prompted me to contact my new lawyer to check the quote and they were certain there would be no adjustment adding 'that's a rule of the bid4fees site'
...just curious, did you decide to use it after all?
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Stillness says...
7:38am Tue 31 Aug 10