Client Care | Family Legal Aid Services Auckland

STANDARD TERMS OF ENGAGEMENT (Terms)

Introduction

These Terms apply to all work carried out by us, current engagement as well as any future engagement, whether or not we send another copy of the terms to you, except to the extent we otherwise agree with you in writing.

Services

The services we are to provide for you are outlined in our letter of engagement.

Communications

We will report to you, by email, periodically on the progress of any engagement and we will inform you of any material and unexpected delays, significant changes or complications in the work being undertaken. You may request a progress report at any time.

Fees

The basis upon which we will charge our fees is set out in our engagement letter.

If the engagement letter specifies a fixed fee, we will charge this for the agreed scope of the Services. Work which falls outside that scope will be charged on an hourly rate basis. We will advise you as soon as reasonably practicable if it becomes necessary for us to provide services outside of the agreed scope and, if requested, give you an estimate of the likely amount of the further costs.

Where our fees are calculated on an hourly basis, the hourly rates of the people we expect to undertake the work are set out in our engagement letter. Time spent is recorded in six-minute units.

Hourly fees may be adjusted (upwards or downwards) to ensure the fee is fair and reasonable to take into account matters such as: the complexity, urgency, value and importance of the Services. Full details of the relevant fee factors are set out in Rule 9 of the Lawyers and Conveyancers Act (Lawyers: Conduct and Client Care) Rules 2008 (Rules).

Disbursements and Third Party Expenses

We may incur disbursements and payments to third parties on your behalf, such as: search and registration fees, LIM costs, court filing fees, travel, courier charges, expert or counsel fees which are reasonably necessary to provide our services.

You authorise us to incur these disbursements. You also authorise us to make payments to third parties on your behalf. These costs will be included in our invoice as “disbursements” when the expenses are incurred.

Administrative expenses

We may charge an administrative fee to cover out of pocket costs which are not included in our fee and disbursements. These include items such as: photocopying; printing; postage and phone calls.

GST

GST is payable by you on our fees and charges.

Invoices

We will send interim invoices to you, usually monthly, and on completion of the matter, or termination of our engagement. We may send you invoices more frequently when we incur a significant expense or undertake a significant amount of work over a shorter period of time.

Payment

Invoices are payable within 7 days of the date of the invoice, unless alternative arrangements have been made with us.

If your account is overdue we may:

Require interest to be paid on any amount which is more than 7 days overdue, calculated at the rate of 15 % per annum
Stop work on any matters in respect of which we are providing services to you
Require an additional payment of fees in advance or other security before recommencing work
Recover from you in full any costs we incur (including costs on a solicitor/client basis) in seeking to recover the overdue amounts from you, including our own fees and the fees of any collection agency.

Payment may be made online

Deposit Slip

Fees and disbursements in advance:
Estimates:
Third Parties:
Trust Accounting:
Confidentiality:
Personal information and Privacy:
Retention of Files and Documents:
Conflicts of Interest:
Duty of Care:
Limitations on our Obligations or Liability:
Termination:

We may ask you to pre-pay amounts to us, or to provide security for our fees and expenses. We may do this, on reasonable notice, at any time. These payments will be held in our trust account and will only be paid to us by way of deduction when we have issued you with an invoice for the work done and obtained your written authority.

We will provide you with an estimate of costs. An estimate is not a quote. We will inform you if we are likely to exceed the estimate by any substantial amount. Unless specified, an estimate excludes GST, disbursements and expenses.

Although you may expect to be reimbursed by a third party for our fees and expenses, and although our invoices may at your request or with your approval be directed to a third party, you remain responsible for payment to us in accordance with these Terms, if the third party fails to pay us.

We operate a trust account. All money received from you or on your behalf will be held to your credit in our trust account.

Payments out of the trust account will be made either to you or to others with your authority. Written authorisation from you (and if we are acting for more than one of you, from all of you) will be required when payment is to be made to a third party. Before making a payment into another account we will require verification of the account details by provision of any of the following: a deposit slip; cheque or bank statement showing the account number; a signed authority from you including the bank account details; or a signed letter from the relevant financial institution providing bank account details.
A full record of our trust account is kept at all times. A statement of trust account transactions detailing funds received and payments made on your behalf will be provided to you periodically and at any time upon your request.
Unless it is not reasonable or practicable to do so, when we hold significant funds for you for more than a short period of time, we will place it in a on-call deposit with a registered bank. Interests earned from on-call deposits, less withholding tax and any administrative fee payable to us, will be credited to you.

We will hold in confidence all information concerning you or your affairs that we acquire during the course of acting for you. We will not disclose any of this information to any other person except:

To the extent necessary or desirable to enable us to carry out your instructions; or
As expressly or impliedly agreed by you; or
As necessary to protect our interests in respect of any complaint or dispute; or
To the extent required; or permitted by law

Confidential information concerning you will as far as practicable be made available only to those within our firm who are providing legal services for you.

We may disclose your name and address to third parties such as credit agencies to perform a credit reference or to undertake credit management or collection processes if it is reasonable to do so. The information we collect and hold about you will be kept at our offices and/or at secure file storage sites (including electronic file storage sites) elsewhere.

Unless you instruct us in writing otherwise, you authorise us and consent to us, without further reference to you, to destroy or delete in the case of electronic records, all files and documents in respect of our Services, 7 years after the date our engagement ends. This does not include any documents that we hold in safe custody for you or are otherwise obliged by law to retain for a longer period.

We are obliged to protect and promote your interests to the exclusion of the interests of third parties and ourselves as set out in the Lawyers and Conveyancers Act (Lawyers: Conduct and Client Care Rules 2008 (RCCC). We have procedures in place to identify and respond to conflicts of interest or potential conflicts of interest. If a conflict of interest arises we will advise you of this and follow the requirements and procedures set out in the RCCC.

Our duty of care is to you and not to any other person. We owe no liability to any other person including for example any directors, shareholders, associated companies, employees or family members unless we expressly agree in writing. We do not accept any responsibility or liability whatsoever to any third parties who may be affected by our performance of the Services or who may rely on any advice we give, except as expressly agreed by us in writing.

Our advice is opinion only, based on the facts known to us and on our professional judgement, and is subject to any changes in the law after the date on which the advice is given. We are not liable for errors in, or omissions from, any information provided by third parties. Our advice relates only to each particular matter in respect of which you engage us. Once that matter is at an end, we will not owe you any duty or liability in respect of any related or other matters unless you specifically engage us in respect of those related or other matters. Unless otherwise agreed, we may communicate with you and with others by electronic means. We cannot guarantee that these communications will not be lost or affected for some reason beyond our reasonable control, and we will not be liable for any damage or loss caused thereby.

To the extent allowed by law, our aggregate liability to you in connection with our Services is limited to the amount available to be payable under the Professional Indemnity Insurance held by the firm.

You may terminate our retainer at any time. We may terminate our retainer in any of the circumstances set out in the RCCC including the existence of a conflict of interest, non-payment of fees, and failure to provide instructions. If our retainer is terminated you must pay us all fees, disbursements and expenses incurred up to the date of termination.