By Sarah McDermott, Private Client Paralegal

A Paralegal is legally trained and educated to perform legal tasks and offer legal assistance, but is not a qualified Solicitor. Paralegals usually specialise in a particular area of law.

Paralegals are being given more and more powers to act on behalf of clients, and they can do virtually everything that a Solicitor can do, except activities that are referred to as “Reserved Activities”, such as representing you at Court, conducting litigation or the signing of certain documents on your behalf. However, Paralegals are able to advise you, prepare documents and guide you through the various stages of your case.

Paralegals are supervised by a qualified Solicitor within their department, and have to adhere to the same confidentially and other codes of conduct as a Solicitor.

Generally, the hourly rate of a paralegal is cheaper than that of a Solicitor, and so, depending on the complexity of your matter, it may be more cost effective for you to instruct a Paralegal rather than a Solicitor.

At Onions & Davies, in both our Private Client and Property departments, we employ both Paralegals and Solicitors, so that we can arrange for your work to be done in the most cost-efficient way for you.

For any enquiry in relation to either of those areas of work, please contact Sarah McDermott (Private Client) on 01630 417092, sarah@onionsanddavies.co.uk, or Katherine Price (Property) on 01630 411227, katherine@onionsanddavies.co.uk.