One source claimed that with higher remuneration available for repossession business, solicitors’ focus would be drawn towards this area and turnaround times for residential work would suffer.
He claimed that one major solicitor firm was already rumoured to be behind on its residential work at one of its offices due to the sheer number of repossessions it was currently dealing with.
One anonymous broker said that he had not seen any anecdotal evidence, but had been messed around so much that he now only dealt with one or two firms.
Eddie Goldsmith, senior partner at Goldsmith Williams, agreed that firms who dealt with both residential and repossession business could see standards slip due to the time constraints of repossession work.
“While repossessions were slow, a lot of these firms would have switched to work with lenders and residential business. Repossessions are more profitable though and if these firms are now working on more of them, we might see ordinary business slip back. I don’t know if this is happening yet but it is a logical argument.
“Repossessions have to be prioritised for time scale reasons as well, as there is the issuing of documents and court dates to work to. But in this day and age, with advancements in technology, it shouldn’t be taking longer to process legal work.”
