Transparency rules have benefitted firms and consumers
New rules requiring law firms to proactively publish key price and service information have had a positive effect, a report published by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) has found.
According to the independent report commissioned by the SRA and prepared by researchers Economic Insight, the SRA transparency rules introduced in 2019 helped consumers make informed decisions and aided firms in attracting new business.
The transparency rules require all SRA-regulated law firms to publish certain information on price, how services will be delivered and their complaints procedures on their website, or offline if they do not have a web presence. Firms with a website must also display the SRA clickable logo, which links visitors to confirmation that the firm is regulated and the protections they can therefore expect.
The report found that more than half of those who had recently engaged with a legal services provider reported comparing price and service information before selecting an individual provider. Some 55% of individuals and 61% of SMEs who compared costs and services of different legal services providers found it easy to do so using information available online, while 21% of individuals found it difficult to compare this information.
SRA chief executive Paul Philip explained that the regulator had introduced the transparency rules “because all the evidence showed neither the public nor small businesses had the information they needed”.
He said that the review showed that was changing. “We want to see that progress continue, increasing access to justice and boosting competition across the whole of the legal market,” he said. “We'll continue to monitor the effects of the rules going forward and our board will consider whether and how we should enhance our requirements and the supporting resources that we provide to firms and consumers.”
The review found scope to improve law firm compliance with the rules, and to encourage greater consumer awareness of, and access to the information available. While the majority of law firms surveyed declared they were compliant with the various elements of the transparency rules, only 42% said they were publishing all the required information.
The SRA’s own spot checks suggested that, even among firms who declared they were complying, “many are not meeting all the requirements of the rules”. The SRA said it was continuing work to check compliance levels, offering to support to firms where improvements needed to be made, but taking action where they were wilfully failing to adhere.