Reader Gareth recently made the offen­sive and defam­a­tory sug­ges­tion that Geeklawyer is so des­per­ate and short­sighted that he may be hav­ing an affair with Ruthie. Well he was nearly right except that the object of his affec­tion is the Wok­ing law firm Buglear Bate who’s glo­ri­ously insou­ciant web­site is, he will reluc­tantly admit, even bet­ter than equal to his own. It recently won the award of ‘best legal web­site ever’. Don’t be fooled by the cun­ning retro mid-90’s ama­teur­ish design: this site con­tains some stun­ning insights and advice:

Tip on costs: … your solic­i­tor … will charge … (actu­ally, usu­ally in 6-minute chunks) for all time spent on the case … Try, there­fore, to … Avoid gen­eral chats about the iniq­ui­ties of your oppo­nent, the judge, the legal sys­tem gen­er­ally unless it’s rel­e­vant … The solic­i­tor, being a polite and charm­ing indi­vid­ual, will lis­ten sym­pa­thet­i­cally but expen­sively … Save the chat for your friends & fam­ily. They may be less charm­ing but they are usu­ally cheaper.

Good advice but which won’t help Geeklawyer to buy another yacht and Bent­ley Continental.

On kids in divorce:

… A tricky ques­tion, but they have to sleep some­where. Is a solic­i­tor nec­es­sary for this? Well, we are bet­ter at wind­ing every­one up than most people…

On the allure of being a solicitor-advocate as motivation:

Oh, the glam­our of mix­ing with estate agents; the travel; the wild call of a well-drawn lease­hold enfran­chise­ment notice; and, deep down, the social com­mit­ment. Money is entirely secondary.

On doing legal aid:

Does Buglear Bate do legal aid?

Er… no. We used to, but we got too used to liv­ing indoors and eating.

On deal­ing with solic­i­tors (equally applic­a­ble to the Bar — but since we are posher than solic­i­tors add in plenty of for­lock tug­ging and an extra dol­lop of def­er­ence to your social betters):

  • Avoid vio­lence unless absolutely nec­es­sary (par­tic­u­larly impor­tant in Geeklawyer’s case since he is trained in Karate and also always has weapons close to hand). Avoid eye con­tact, dis­plays of emo­tion or sud­den move­ments near your solic­i­tor (eye con­tact demon­strates a lack of def­er­ence & most lawyers regard emo­tional clients with pity and con­tempt: these will result in you being charged more for a poorer ser­vice.)
  • Give your solic­i­tor gifts and small treats from time to time. It helps main­tain his/her atten­tion. (A yacht is always wel­come, as is a bevy of under­age hook­ers for the week­end or a kilo of cocaine)
  • Make fre­quent unso­licited large pay­ments on account of legal expenses.
  • Empha­size that as far as you’re con­cerned it’s not the win­ning or los­ing but the tak­ing part that’s important

Hats off to Brucey and Batey. A pity they don’t do IP or IT law.