The Citizens Advice Bureau is probably well known by many students all the way up to those with little interest in law, and is a pro bono charity that helps out a lot of people.
However they are gradually starting to charge for their advice, as they market themselves as a cheaper alternative to solicitors.
According to The Law Society Gazette (4 May 2015), Citizens Advice has charged clients for employment advice since April 2013 but has rebranded their offer in the last two months, with the aim of helping/serving far more people. Job Law is what they created back in April 2013 with the help of Gateshead CAB Enterprises (which is the company behind the financing and support of what the local advice centres do), and they have just rebranded the offer, offered by Job Law.
They now offer free 15-minute consultations followed by advice charged at £88 per hour.
Quite simply, Job Law fills the gap for clients who no longer have access to legal aid.
Is their solution viable? Possibly according to the article – given that even High Street Solicitors’ fees are around £180 per hour at a minimum, and this is far too high for many clients, and with no win no fee arrangements meaning clients are losing a lot of their settlement money to solicitors fees this may be a better solution.
They provide “a half-price, professional legal advice service for employment claimants. The first consultant is free and any further advice is on a “pay as you go” basis.”
I suppose many of you will be wondering what happens to the money from the fees obtained – well the terms of Gateshead CAB Enterprises stipulate that 100% of profits are put back into the CAB to provide free advice and services to their clients.
In terms of their Job Law section – some of the areas they cover include unfair dismissal, redundancy, discrimination, and TUPE transfers.
CAB have said that Job Law is still being run as a trial in Gateshead as a means of finding alternative ways of bringing in funds, and apparently there is a similar scheme running in Stevenage.
I will check this out and get back to you on this!
In the meantime what are your thoughts, should ‘pro-bono’ clinics be charging for their time and legal advice? Interesting topic of debate!
Rebecca x