The amendment to the Civil Procedure Rules to state that solicitors responding to claims for damages issued via the Damages Claims Portal (DCP) must respond using the DCP has been delayed and a new date will be shared by HMCTS soon.
In the meantime HMCTS advises that the following steps are taken:
If your firm is not registered with MyHMCTS please register now. New applications for registration are normally processed within 1-2 days.
Once registered check the list of new unallocated cases on your MyHMCTS dashboard regularly so that new cases are identified and allocated to a solicitor.
Don’t forget there is still time to get involved in Caritas Aspire’s Miles that Matter initiative.
Between 6th June and 8th July 2022, we are asking you to encourage all family and friends to sponsor you to walk, run, cycle (or any active travel you choose) part of the distance of one of the four journeys taken by Caritas Aspire students. They travelled, often by foot, from their war-torn countries to the U.K. in search of a safe home and future for their family.
Wazia – Evacuation to Kabul Aiport – 20 miles/32 km
Eisa – Calais to Dover – 40 miles/64 km
Daniella – Ukraine to Poland – 80 miles/130 km
Karim – Across the Mediterranean – 400 miles/640 km
Don’t worry if you are too busy to commit to a large distance. Last year distances travelled ranged from the hundreds of miles to just a few. Every little helps, as they say!
If you would like to help but are too busy to participate yourself, then you can always help out by spreading the word or perhaps making a donation yourself.
Caritas Aspire works alongside refugees and asylum seekers in order to assist in their journey of wellbeing and integration. They do this by providing high quality language lessons, delivered in a welcoming community environment, mentoring into further education and employment, and wrap-around well-being services.
As promised, please find the first edition of the MLS Court Reports Journal here!
This new journal is launched in partnership with our friends at Legal RSS and will provide a summary of recent court reports which we hope will be an invaluable addition to your own understanding and awareness of recent court judgements.
We would love to hear your feedback so let us know what you think!
There are different motivations for making the switch from client accounts to Third-Party Managed Accounts (TPMA). For some, it is the time and cost savings, for others it is more about delivering an improved client service. Where a TPMA becomes a business-critical solution is when it comes to managing risk.
There are three critical areas of risk law firms must manage effectively to stay competitive in an increasingly challenging market, all of which using a TPMA can support.
Regulatory risk
The misuse of client money is one of the sector’s biggest regulatory risks. The rules for managing a client account are stringent, meaning compliance is a great burden for law firms.
With a TPMA, however, this is greatly reduced as it is not subject to the same reporting hardship.
Regulators require less oversight over the accounts because the money is not held or received by the law firm and the law firm is not holding the funds on trust for its clients. Under the SRA rules, for example, funds held in a TPMA are not classified as client money and all associated rules do not apply.
Operational risk
While fee earners and legal cashiers are still in control of the payments process when using a TPMA, they also benefit from additional protections and improved systems. The payments process with a TPMA doesn’t allow for payments to go unaccounted for, for issues with residual balances to occur and minimises the risk of the funds being used for fraudulent activity or money laundering.
Financial crime risk
All parties involved in a transaction through a regulated TPMA provider must be verified through rigorous due diligence checks. This process prevents illegal activity and flags any errors there may be in the account information of payers or payees.
Working with a regulated TPMA provider, like Shieldpay, adds a further layer of protection to the firm and their underlying client as they must comply with extensive reporting and regulatory requirements to maintain the highest standards of payment security.
If you want to learn more about using a TPMA and the benefits to your law firm, speak to the Shieldpay team today and book in a demo of our digital escrow platform: sales@shieldpay.com
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