Kevin's Blog
The Statute of Limitations is fairly clear. If you have a personal injury action, you must issue your proceedings within two years. If you have a defamation action, you must issue your proceedings within one year. If you have a breach of contract case, you have to issue proceedings within six years and this is the heading under which most people will sue their solicitor if there is a question of negligence.
What is the position however where that solicitor acts in a negligent manner but continues to act for you? By a strange coincidence I have two cases at the moment involving solicitors who continued to act for clients for several years until in fact the six year period had passed and the client then came to me.
The basic rule is that if you know or if you ought to have known that your solicitor had acted in a negligent manner, then you have six years from the date of that knowledge to issue your proceedings. Even if your solicitor says, “don’t worry, I made a mistake here but I’ll work it out – leave it with me”, you could still have a problem. This is the position I have in these two particular cases. In one of them I think we have managed to overcome the problem but in the other one, I have a barrister telling me that if we issue proceedings, the chances of success are no more than 50/50. The law is extremely complex in this area.
The basic lesson to learn from this however is that if you suspect that your solicitor has acted in a negligent manner and that you have suffered a loss as a result, get a second opinion. There is nothing to stop you going to another solicitor and telling them what has happened and asking for a view as to how you should proceed.
Otherwise you could be statute barred from bringing any claim in the future.
Kevin Brophy
Brophy Solicitors
The Statute of Limitations is fairly clear. If you have a personal injury action, you must issue your proceedings within two years. If you have a defamation action, you must issue your proceedings within one year. If you have a breach of contract case, you have to issue proceedings within six years and this is the heading under which most people will sue their solicitor if there is a question of negligence.
What is the position however where that solicitor acts in a negligent manner but continues to act for you? By a strange coincidence I have two cases at the moment involving solicitors who continued to act for clients for several years until in fact the six year period had passed and the client then came to me.
The basic rule is that if you know or if you ought to have known that your solicitor had acted in a negligent manner, then you have six years from the date of that knowledge to issue your proceedings. Even if your solicitor says, “don’t worry, I made a mistake here but I’ll work it out – leave it with me”, you could still have a problem. This is the position I have in these two particular cases. In one of them I think we have managed to overcome the problem but in the other one, I have a barrister telling me that if we issue proceedings, the chances of success are no more than 50/50. The law is extremely complex in this area.
The basic lesson to learn from this however is that if you suspect that your solicitor has acted in a negligent manner and that you have suffered a loss as a result, get a second opinion. There is nothing to stop you going to another solicitor and telling them what has happened and asking for a view as to how you should proceed.
Otherwise you could be statute barred from bringing any claim in the future.
Kevin Brophy
Brophy Solicitors
The Statute of Limitations is fairly clear. If you have a personal injury action, you must issue your proceedings within two years.London solicitors
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