Founded in 2001 by Michael Coyle, Lawdit ® has since grown to become one of the most respected law firms in the UK.
We pride ourselves on offering a cost-effective service – our hourly rate ranges from £130 – £295 + VAT, compared to the £400 – £600 charged by many of our rivals – that comprises results-driven advice and representation.
Because our working practice is built around internet and telephone communication, this enables us to keep overheads to a minimum – savings that we pass on to our clients.
We work on the principle that a good solicitor is not just there to help you when things go wrong – it is also our job to put in place legal safeguards and contracts that ensure you don’t encounter problems in the first place.
We want to give you the best possible service. However, if at any point you become unhappy or concerned about the service, we have provided then you should inform us immediately, so that we can do our best to resolve the problem.
In the first instance it may be helpful to contact the person who is working on your case to discuss your concerns and we will do our best to resolve any issues. If you would like to make a formal complaint and you are unhappy about any aspect of the service you have received or about the bill for legal services, please contact Michael Coyle on 023 8023 5979 or michael.coyle@lawdit.co.uk or by post to our Southampton office with full details of your complaint. If you are unsatisfied then your complaint will be escalated internally. We have eight weeks to consider your complaint. Making a complaint will not affect how we handle your case.
What to do if we cannot resolve your complaint
The Legal Ombudsman can help you if we are unable to resolve your complaint ourselves. They will look at your complaint independently and it will not affect how we handle your case.
Before accepting a complaint for investigation, the Legal Ombudsman will check that you have tried to resolve your complaint with us first. If you have, then you must take your complaint to the Legal Ombudsman:
Within six months of receiving a final response to your complaint
and
No more than six years from the date of act/omission; or
No more than three years from when you should reasonably have known there was cause for complaint.
If you would like more information about the Legal Ombudsman, please contact them.
Contact details
Visit: www.legalombudsman.org.uk
Call: 0300 555 0333 between 9.00 to 17.00.
Email: enquiries@legalombudsman.org.uk
Legal Ombudsman PO Box 6806, Wolverhampton, WV1 9WJ
What to do if you are unhappy with our behaviour
The Solicitors Regulation Authority can help if you are concerned about our behaviour. This could be for things like dishonesty, taking or losing your money or treating you unfairly because of your age, a disability or other characteristic.
Visit their website to see how you can raise your concerns with the Solicitors Regulation Authority.
https://www.sra.org.uk/consumers/problems/report-solicitor
PLEASE READ THESE TERMS AND CONDITIONS CAREFULLY BEFORE USING THIS SITE
www.lawdit.co.uk (our ‘Site’) is operated by Lawdit Solicitors Limited (“We”). We are registered in England and Wales under company number 4714251 and have our registered office at 4 Brunswick Place Southampton SO15 2AN. Our main trading address is 4 Brunswick Place Southampton SO15 2AN. Our VAT number is 780 9109 15.We are Authorised and regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority under number 382025. We are a limited company. To contact us, please email info@lawdit.co.uk or telephone our office line on 02380235979. Lawdit Solicitors is the trading name of Lawdit Solicitors Limited, a company incorporated in England and Wales under company number 4714251. We provide legal services and are authorised and regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority under number 382025. Our VAT number is 780910915
We will update you regularly with progress on your matter following agreed events. We will communicate with you in plain language and explain to you the legal work required as your matter progresses. We will update you on costs at agreed events if we have agreed to charge you on an hourly basis.
We will update you on whether the likely outcomes still justify the likely costs and risks associated with your matter whenever there is a material change in circumstances. We will update you on the likely timescales for each stage of this matter and any important changes in those estimates.
We will continue to review whether there are alternative methods by which your matter can be funded if we have agreed to charge you on an hourly basis.
Whether you are a consumer or a business user:
We do not exclude or limit in any way our liability to you where it would be unlawful to do so. This includes liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence or the negligence of our employees, agents or subcontractors and for fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation.
We exclude all implied conditions, warranties, representations or other terms that may apply to our Site or any content on it.
We will not be liable to you for any loss or damage, whether in contract, tort (including negligence), breach of statutory duty, or otherwise, even if foreseeable, arising under or in connection with:
use of, or inability to use, our Site; or
use of or reliance on any content displayed on our Site.
In particular, we will not be liable for:
loss of profits, sales, business, or revenue;
business interruption;
loss of anticipated savings;
loss of business opportunity, goodwill or reputation; or
any indirect or consequential loss or damage.
If you are a consumer user:
Please note that we only provide our Site for domestic and private use. You agree not to use our Site for any commercial or business purposes, and we have no liability to you for any loss of profit, loss of business, business interruption, or loss of business opportunity.
If defective digital content that we have supplied, damages a device or digital content belonging to you and this is caused by our failure to use reasonable care and skill, we will either repair the damage or pay you compensation. However, we will not be liable for damage that you could have avoided by following our advice to apply an update offered to you free of charge or for damage that was caused by you failing to correctly follow installation instructions or to have in place the minimum system requirements advised by us.
We will only use your personal information as set out in our Privacy Policy.
We are not responsible for viruses and you must not introduce them
We do not guarantee that our Site will be secure or free from bugs or viruses.
You are responsible for configuring your information technology, computer programmes and platform to access our Site. You should use your own virus protection software.
You must not misuse our Site by knowingly introducing viruses, trojans, worms, logic bombs or other material that is malicious or technologically harmful. You must not attempt to gain unauthorised access to our Site, the server on which our Site is stored or any server, computer or database connected to our Site. You must not attack our Site via a denial-of-service attack or a distributed denial-of service a
We are obliged to treat your information as confidential in relation to the work we undertake on your behalf. Our use of that information is subject to your instructions, the Data Protection Act 1998 and our duty of confidentiality. This means that anything you tell us cannot be disclosed to third parties without your express permission. You have a right of access under data protection legislation to the personal data we hold about you. We may need to disclose information about you and your matter to third parties, such as expert witnesses or barristers, for example. In exceptional circumstances, a court may order us to disclose information about you, including information which would otherwise be deemed confidential.
We use the information you provide primarily for the provision of legal services to you and for related purposes including:
updating and enhancing client records;
analysis to help us manage our practice;
statutory returns; and
legal and regulatory compliance.
We may from time to time send you information that we think might be of interest to you. If you do not wish to receive that information please notify our Southampton office in writing.
The Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, the Money Laundering Regulations 2007 and the Solicitors Regulation Authority require all solicitors to:
undertake identity (including address) checks on a regular basis in relation to all clients;
ensure that each client, its business and its source of funds are known;
keep records of the identity and address checks for at least five years;
report to the authorities (without notifying the client) any suspicion of money laundering; and
cease acting for the client (without explaining why to the client) if such a report is made unless and until the authorities give consent to proceed or unless and until consent is deemed to have been given pursuant to certain statutory provisions.
We will require you to provide us with certain information and documents before we are able to act for you. This information must be provided to us immediately following the request unless we specify otherwise. We will have to cease acting for you if you are unable to comply with these requirements.
We may require you to make a payment to us on account of fees, disbursements and expenses at any time and on more than one occasion. The receipt of any such payment on account will be a condition of acting or continuing to act for you. Our total bill may be higher than the amount you have paid on account, in which case you will need to pay the balance owing to us. Money paid on account which is not subsequently required for fees, disbursements and expenses will be refunded to you.
Where we receive money from you which is to be applied on your behalf (including payments on account), it will (unless agreed otherwise with you) be held in our general client account which is subject to the strict provisions of the Solicitors’ Accounts Rules.
Which country’s laws apply to any disputes?
If you are a consumer, please note that these terms of use, their subject matter and their formation, are governed by English law. You and we both agree that the courts of England and Wales will have exclusive jurisdiction except that if you are a resident of Northern Ireland you may also bring proceedings in Northern Ireland, and if you are resident of Scotland, you may also bring proceedings in Scotland.
If you are a business, these terms of use, their subject matter and their formation (and any non-contractual disputes or claims) are governed by English law. We both agree to the exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of England and Wales.
Lawdit is committed to providing legal advice and client care of the highest quality. In the unlikely event you are unhappy about any aspect of the service you have received or about the bill for legal services, please contact Michael Coyle on 023 8023 5979 or michael.coyle@lawdit.co.uk or by post to our Southampton office with full details of your complaint. If you are unsatisfied then your complaint will be escalated internally.
We have eight weeks to consider your complaint. If we have not resolved it within this time or you are not satisfied with our handling of your complaint, you may ask the Legal Ombudsman to consider the matter. You can write to the Legal Ombudsman at PO Box 6806, Wolverhampton, WV1 9WJ. You can also make contact by phone on 0300 555 0333 or by email to enquiries@legalombudsman.org.uk.
You will normally need to bring a complaint to the Legal Ombudsman within six months of receiving a final written response from us about your complaint or within six years of the act or omission about which you are complaining of. If the alleged act or omission took place outside of this period, you will need to raise a complaint within three years of the date when you should reasonably have been aware of it.
We have professional indemnity insurance to cover any claim brought by you in the unlikely event that we breach our duty of care to you. Details of this insurance, including contact details for our insurer and the territorial coverage of the policy can be inspected at our offices or made available on request.
Our liability to you for a breach of your instructions shall be limited to £3,000,000 (three million pounds sterling), unless we notify you otherwise. We shall not be liable for any consequential, special, indirect or exemplary damages, costs or losses, or any damages, costs or losses attributable to lost profits or opportunities.
After completing work on your matter, we will be entitled to keep all your papers and documents while there is still money owed to us for fees, disbursements and expenses.
We will keep our file of your papers for up to six years, except those papers that you ask to be returned to you. We keep files on the understanding they can be destroyed six years after the date of the final bill. We will not destroy documents you ask us to deposit in safe custody. If we take papers or documents out of storage in relation to continuing or new instructions to act for you, we will not normally charge for such retrieval. We may, however, charge you in relation to reading correspondence or other work necessary to comply with your instructions in relation to the retrieved papers.
Where you ae acting as a consumer ie if we buy and sell your domestic house the Consumer Protection (Distance Selling) Regulations 2000 apply where we do not meet with you. This means that you have the right to cancel your instructions to us within seven working days from the date of receiving this client care letter, although you shall be liable for any costs, disbursements or expenses incurred up until the date of cancellation. Any cancellation of instructions should be provided to us in writing as soon as possible.
You may end your instructions to us in writing at any time, but we will be entitled to keep all documents relating to your matter while there is still money owed to us for fees, disbursements and expenses. We may only decide to cease acting for you with good reason and we are required to give you reasonable notice that we will stop acting for you. If you or we decide that we should stop acting for you, you will pay our charges up until that point. These are calculated with reference to how we agreed to charge you at the outset of the matter, together with all disbursements and expenses incurred on your behalf.
☐ I confirm that I have read through the terms and conditions outlined in this document and I hereby agree to abide by them.
☐ I consent to my details being used by Lawdit to send me occasional newsletters or other information that may be of interest to me from time to time. I understand I can opt out of this service at any time by notifying Lawdit in writing by writing to Michael Coyle at Michael.coyle@lawdit.co.uk
☐ Please remove me from your database and don’t contact me again!.
Since starting Lawdit ® in 2001, we have worked with hundreds of clients across the globe. Here’s some feedback from them about our services.
Principal and founder Michael Coyle, lives in Wootton on the Isle of Wight and following a conversation on the daily trip over the pond on the Red Jet with his trainee solicitor, island born and Newport based Mark Reed, it led to a decision that the island can be a great place to add to the firms offices which will also help with time and money spent commuting every day.
We have built up our client base on the Island and are proud to work with them from our Newport offices.
Michael is Lawdit’s ® Principal and heads our Commercial and Intellectual Property Department. As a Solicitor Advocate, he is one of a select group of legal experts qualified to represent clients as an advocate in the Higher Courts in England and Wales.
He holds a Master of Laws degree (LL.M) from Nottingham Trent University and is a guest lecturer at Southampton Solent University. He has also completed a teaching stint at the Academy of Music in Guildford where Michael taught copyright law.
Michael is highly regarded for his work in all areas of intellectual property law (which includes the eCommerce and IT fields), litigation and company/commercial matters. He regularly advises on non-contentious issues including regulatory and statutory obligations and has been involved in many successful disputes, with a strong reputation for finding common sense and practical solutions for clients.
Michael was involved in the high-profile patent infringement case of Sabaf v. Meneghetti (House of Lords) in which he acted for MFI. He also acts for the UK Web Design Association (UKWDA) and many high-profile clients. He is highly regarded for his proactive and helpful approach in assisting and nurturing new and innovative technology start-ups.
In 2017, Michael was awarded the honorary degree of Doctor of Law from Southampton Solent University for his contribution to the University and his continued support to its students.
Direct contact details:
Lawdit is committed to providing legal advice and client care of the highest quality. In the unlikely event you are unhappy about any aspect of the service you have received or about the bill for legal services, please contact Michael Coyle on 023 8023 5979 or michael.coyle@lawdit.co.uk or by post to our Southampton office with full details of your complaint. If you are unsatisfied then your complaint will be escalated internally.
We have eight weeks to consider your complaint. If we have not resolved it within this time or you are not satisfied with our handling of your complaint, you may ask the Legal Ombudsman to consider the matter. You can write to the Legal Ombudsman at PO Box 6806, Wolverhampton, WV1 9WJ. You can also make contact by phone on 0300 555 0333 or by email to enquiries@legalombudsman.org.uk.
You will normally need to bring a complaint to the Legal Ombudsman within six months of receiving a final written response from us about your complaint or within six years of the act or omission about which you are complaining of. If the alleged act or omission took place outside of this period, you will need to raise a complaint within three years of the date when you should reasonably have been aware of it.
Lawdit ® Solicitors is the trading name of Lawdit Solicitors Ltd. Regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority of England and Wales.
