The Gazette 1974

tor becoming involved in unnecessary personal expense to medical witnesses with no hope of reimbursement, and naturally such expense will be added to your other expenses which must be incurred if the action is to come to trial. CONVEYANCING A great deal can be said about this particular prac- tice, but from the point of view of the client the most important thing is the stamp duty, registration fees, mortgage fees and a general appreciation of the total financial position in connection with in all probability the sale of the client's own house and the purchase of a new house either on a new estate or one of the older vintage, coupled with the arrangement of the necessary finances from a lending institution to cover the appro- priate margin to enable the transaction to be finalised. There will also be the problem of providing the client with the necessary bridging finance, to complete the purchase of his new house, so that he can give possession of his old one to the purchaser of his old property. Sometimes there are existing mortgages to be discharged on the old property and new mortgages to be created on the new one involving complicated accountancy pro- cedure which will render it necessary for the solicitor acting to give undertakings to the financial institution providing the bridging finance, and it is the giving of these undertakings that extreme care must be exercised. It is suggested that no undertaking whatsoever be given by a solicitor until he has obtained from his client an irrevocable retainer coupled with an irrevocable autho- rity authorising the solicitor to give an undertaking to the bank or other financial institution to lodge the pro- ceeds of the sale of the client's house to the credit of his particular account with the bank, and also to lodge the proceeds of the mortgage advance on the new house when same is made available by the particular lending institution concerned. An irrevocable retainer and an irrevocable authority is necessary because it is competent for any client to discharge the retainer of his solicitor after the solicitor has given the necessary undertakings and in such cir- cumstances the solicitor concerned has no authority to withold the documents from the client's newly appointed solicitor, on payment of his proper costs and charges. He is not apparently entitled or in a position to revoke the undertakings already given to the lending institu- tions, who have in fact advanced the money or part thereof leaving the solicitor in the very uncomfortable position of having to honour his undertaking in cir- cumstances where there is no hope of recoupment. There is a case on record where the solicitor con- cerned in such case was called upon and did in fact honour the undertaking, thereby suffering the loss as there was no source from which it was recoverable, the particular client having gone out of the jurisdiction in circumstances which rendered it impossible for the soli- citor to pursue his remedies. The general inference to be drawn in matters of this kind is for solicitors to be extremely reluctant to give undertakings except in circumstances where they are absolutely sure of their client's integrity and financial standing, and in such circumstances where the solicitor cannot be removed from control of the finances until such time as the undertaking is fully honoured and dis- charged. . There is one final point in conveyancing matters and it is this : that a solicitor acting for a purchaser or for a vendor should so far as the purchaser is concerned

collect all stamp duties, registration fees and costs and mortgage fees prior to the completion of the purchase. * Clients expect to pay the full amount and ascertain the full liability at that stage and not five or six months later. So far as vendors are concerned, they prefer to pay all their expenses at the time of the completion of the financial side of their transaction so that no further accounts will be furnished several months later. It is quite clear and well known that failure to adhere to this procedure will result in the solicitor neither receiving his own fees, but he will also find it impossible' to recover the stamp duties and outlays. In addition, the solicitor will have a dis-satisfied client who will not consult him in future transactions, and generally speaking it is bad business from the point of view of the client as well as bad business from the point , of view of the solicitor. Filing (1) Every client is worthy of a file, and this file should be opened immediately after the instructions and attendance has been taken by the solicitor and a registration number should be given for the file. Some solicitors adopt the practice of numbering files on a yearly basis, i.e. in 1973 you start with No. 1 file and end with 700, the first file is called 1/1973 and the other files are numbered consecutively up to the 31st December, 1973, and the same procedure applies for 1974 and consecutively every year thereafter. It is a good practice no matter how small the practice is to have a register of these files opened in alphabetical order and also have a duplicate register giving the reference numbers in numerical order. These files can then be put into filing cabinets alphabetically under the name of the client which makes the file readilv accessable at any time the file is required while it is a current file. When the transaction has been completed and finalised it is usual in some systems to remove the file from the current cabinet and put it away in some registration department giving it a P / A number (i.e. a Put Away number) and establishing a card index for all these files which are completed and put away- This system enables current files to be separated from "dead" files or completed files and contributes towards the efficiency of the establishment in eliminating dead wood from the living trees. (2) There is then of course the problem of dealing with Title Deeds and Documents which are part and parcel of the client's file and in most offices it is the practice to give the bundle of Title Deeds the same reference number as the current file. The various bundles of Deeds and Documents are identifiable by reference to a manilla cover into which Deeds and Documents are placed identifying the Documents with the client's file. These folders and documents can then be placed in a special cabinet and not placed in the filing cabinet because their bulk would render the depositing of the files in a filing cabinet useless, cum- bersome and undesirable. It is vitally important that every bundle of Deeds must have a folder on top identifying them and reliance must not be placed under any circumstances of hoping that the staff will place the client's Deed on the top of the bundle as the final and only means of identification at any given time. Such a practice is fraught with the gravest danger and great frustrations will be suffered in trying to identify deeds 30 FILING, ACCOUNTS AND OFFICE ADMINISTRATION