Direct Public Access- Can Lawyers deliver?

Direct Public Access – Can lawyers deliver?

 Ian Dodd: Business development Director:

The legal regulatory bodies have made it easier for both solicitors and barristers to engage directly with members of the public to provide open and transparent services. Can, though, the establishment make things even easier and overcome the inhibitions and suspicions some of their prospective clients have about the legal profession?

Despite trying and, in some cases, succeeding, to make it easier for lawyers to talk to ordinary folk there does seem to remain a reluctance from Mr and Mrs Public to take their legal problems to those best equipped to solve them.

For many, lawyers seem distant, unapproachable, stuffy, judgemental, intimidating   and, above all, expensive. Some lawyers, though, have gone a long way to ensure that their websites are easily accessible, their high street offices welcoming, their staff down-to-earth and their prices reasonable; though these are in the minority, it seems. There are also some lawyers who don’t want to have ordinary folk as their clients and deliberately discriminate against them and market to the monied middle classes.

Solicitors can find it easier to appeal to and accommodate direct public access clients. Their locations, business plans, experience and general ease-of-use work in their favour. The Bar, however, have a bigger problem. Their offices (or chambers as they will continue to call them) are not, normally, found in that part of town members of the general public frequent. Their tradition and experience is dealing with professional clients. Many don’t have manned reception areas, have inadequate waiting areas and insufficient conference rooms where private discussions can take place. The Bar is also having problems coming to terms with the necessity and mechanism of the ‘up-front’ payment direct public access necessarily demands.

Naturally, the market responds to these opportunities and challenges and there are a growing number of entrepreneurial businesses trying to ensure that it’s as easy as possible for members of the public to make contact with lawyers. These are, mainly, web-based and offer on-line or telephone access to solicitors or barristers with user-friendly and transparent pricing.

All of the above suffer from the same inherent problem; it’s hard for members of the public to find them.

Solicitors’ offices and barristers’ chambers can be hard to find and opening hours and appointment-making might be inconvenient, especially during the working day when it could be hard for a potential direct public access client to get out of work. Some legal businesses are open on Saturday mornings though their, normally, city centre locations can be equally inconvenient for a suburban or country dweller.

Web sites make the search easier, of course, though some degree of knowledge about what to enter into the search engine is needed and, unless the site owner has worked on web site-optimisation, it could be a long and fruitless search.

The easiest way to encourage and allow members of the public to access and use legal services must, surely, be to take those services to them in places they visit regularly or can get to with.

Indeed, there are some solicitors’ businesses who have a presence in public places such as shopping centres and there are others who have dedicated, high street shop-fronts looking more like a shop than a solicitors.

Taking this a logical step further Instant Law are installing private, secure booths or working areas in public libraries up and down the country so that members of the public can, at their convenience and without an appointment, talk to a lawyer and get advice.

Using unique, state-of-the-art video conferencing software and an easy to use, on-screen start page a member of the public can see and speak to a lawyer and, at the end of a 20 or 30 minute, free, initial consultation, will know if they have a case which can be progressed, what the next moves might be and, more importantly, how much it is all liable to cost.

This service is becoming increasingly popular with libraries and a growing number are incorporating it in the wide range of public services they offer to their users.

This democratisation of direct public access is, through public libraries, reaching a wide audience. Birmingham Central Library, for example, has a foot-fall of about 4 million/year and the Paradise Shopping Centre, to which it is attached has a foot-fall of 3 million/week.

Large conurbations, such as Manchester, Liverpool and Newcastle, have about a million people a year using them. There are about 3500 public libraries in the country and they, like every other business, are looking for innovative ways to encourage people to use them and their growing list of services.

Maybe initiatives like Instant Law teaming up with public libraries is one way that the legal profession can widen their appeal and offer members of the public services at their convenience and on their terms?

Ian Dodd:

idodd@ian-network.co.uk     (07766365412)

Before joining Instant Law UK Ian spent six years running a major Chartered Surveying business, which was an introduction to professional services and the last ten years being a CEO in barristers' chambers and forming a start-up Alternative Business Structure. Ian’s experience has given him a thorough understanding of the legal profession