Ad description
A regional press ad and website, seen on 5 February 2016:
a. The regional press ad stated “TOP 5 WAYS YOUR SOLICITOR RIPS YOU OFF…LEARN HOW TO GET YOUR OVERCHARGES BACK! Did you know, on average, a solicitor overcharges you by 20%?”.
b. The website www.recoveryourovercharges.com, stated “The amount solicitors are supposed to charge for their services are [sic] covered by legislation - but in reality many ignore these guidelines … Discover the tricks law firms use to get extra from you, including … Charging you a higher hourly rate than they should”.
Issue
Martin Shepherd Solicitors LLP challenged whether the following claims were misleading and could be substantiated:
1. “…on average a solicitor overcharges you by 20%”; and
2. “The amount solicitors are supposed to charge for their services are [sic] covered by legislation - but in reality many ignore these guidelines”.
Response
1. Recovery Ltd t/a Recoveryourovercharges.com said a 'one-fifth' rule existed and that meant a law costs draft company could only recover their fees from solicitors if they recovered one-fifth or more of their client's legal costs. Therefore, if most solicitors did not overcharge by 20%, the law cost industry would no longer exist".
2. Recovery said that solicitors were governed by the Solicitors Code of Conduct and should therefore provide proper estimates of costs, and when a client was invoiced they should be advised of the right to an assessment under the Solicitors Act 1974. However, they said that this advice was not provided because it would prohibit law costs draft companies acting against a solicitor they had worked with.
Assessment
1. Upheld
The ASA considered that consumers were likely to interpret the claim in ad (a), “… on average, a solicitor overcharges you by 20%”, to mean that solicitors, on average, added 20% onto their fees without proper reason. We understood that a solicitor might use third-party businesses, if necessary, in order to provide additional services, which could include law costs draft companies, and that in circumstances such as those, legitimate related costs may change the fees during the course of providing legal advice. We considered that in order to substantiate the claim, Recovery would need to provide evidence, applicable to all solicitors, to demonstrate that their charges were inflated, by an average of 20%, without proper reason. Recovery did not provide such evidence and we therefore concluded that the ad was misleading.
On that point, ad (a) breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rules 3.1 3.1 Marketing communications must not materially mislead or be likely to do so. (Misleading advertising) and 3.7 3.7 Before distributing or submitting a marketing communication for publication, marketers must hold documentary evidence to prove claims that consumers are likely to regard as objective and that are capable of objective substantiation. The ASA may regard claims as misleading in the absence of adequate substantiation. (Substantiation).
2. Upheld
We noted that ad (b) stated that “The amount solicitors are supposed to charge for their services are [sic] covered by legislation - but in reality many ignore these guidelines”, and we considered that consumers would understand from the claim that there were ‘standards’ for solicitors’ charges, but that they were commonly ignored and, as with point 1 above, in the overall context of the ads, additional fees may be included without proper reason. We acknowledged Recovery’s assertion that solicitors fell under a code of conduct and there were also legal provisions regarding their fees. However, they had not provided any evidence that demonstrated that many solicitors ignored those standards, for example to show that they had been censured under the code of conduct or had been subject to action in relation to guidelines for charges. Because the claim had again not been substantiated, we concluded that the ad was misleading.
On that point ad (b), breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rules 3.1 3.1 Marketing communications must not materially mislead or be likely to do so. (Misleading advertising) and 3.7 3.7 Before distributing or submitting a marketing communication for publication, marketers must hold documentary evidence to prove claims that consumers are likely to regard as objective and that are capable of objective substantiation. The ASA may regard claims as misleading in the absence of adequate substantiation. (Substantiation).
Action
The ad must not appear again in its current form. We told Recovery Ltd t/a Recoveryourovercharges.com not to claim in future that solicitors overcharged their clients or that they ignored relevant guidance in relation to service charges in the absence of adequate substantiation.
