What is a Solicitor? An explanation from JPHLAW Solicitors PortadownA Solicitor is a qualified legal professional who provides expert legal advice and support to clients. A Solicitor’s clients can be individual people, groups, private companies or public sector organisations.
What does a Solicitor do?
After taking instructions from clients, Solicitors will advise on necessary courses of legal action depending on their areas of legal expertise. Most Solicitors in the UK are primarily litigators, although many Solicitors specialise in specific areas of law and some do their own advocacy cases.
Solicitors work directly with clients and although specific work activities will naturally depend on the Solicitor’s area of expertise, they typically involve conversing with clients to establish their firm’s suitability to provide the necessary legal advice and services, taking the client’s instructions and then advising them on the law and legal issues relating to their particular case.
Solicitors deal with all the paperwork and communication involved with their clients’ cases, such as writing documents, letters and contracts tailored to their client’s needs; ensuring the accuracy of legal advice and procedure, and preparing papers for Court.
Solicitors will also negotiate with clients and opposing parties to secure agreed objectives, gather evidence, supervise the implementation of agreements, calculate claims for damages, compensation, loss of earnings, maintenance etc., and co-ordinate the work of all parties involved in the case. Their work ranges across the whole spectrum of legal work from high value commercial work to injury and road traffic accident claims , law of the family issues such the law relating to children and separation and divorce, criminal prosecutions and probate and making wild and the general administration of estates.
Solicitors represent clients in disputes and represent them in Court if necessary. In complex disputes however, Solicitors will often instruct Barristers or specialist advocates to appear in Court on behalf of their clients.
If a case goes to Court, it is unlikely that a Solicitor will represent their client although certain Solicitors can appear in Court as advocates. Instead, a Solicitor will generally refer the work to a Barrister or specialist advocate for expert advice or to instruct them to appear in Court to represent the client.
