Since 2015, Lender & Court Services has offered mediation and legal assistance to individuals facing home repossession or looking to set aside county court judgments. Rather than representing clients in court, they endeavour to inform the individuals so they can navigate the process themselves. The business prides itself on providing solutions through mediation rather than litigation, focusing on a personalised client service. Although this approach has proven successful to date, managing director Luke Memory, is hoping to diversify the company offering even further.
Memory [pictured], a qualified Paralegal, recently spoke to The Parliamentary Review to highlight how the Lender & Court way had proven such a hit with clients since the very beginning: first and foremost, by helping keep legal costs as low as possible.
Memory explained: “When we founded the company, we focused on assisting people to try to prevent the repossession of their homes, an area I had been involved in for over ten years. We do not provide representation in court as we are not a firm of solicitors. Instead, we assist the litigant, informing them of the necessary procedures and how to present and organise any documents that they must submit to the local court.
“While we can refer our clients to one of our external solicitors, we aim to provide support to allow the individual to perform the process themselves in order to keep the costs down.”
As the profile of the company began to grow, it was not long before inquiries began to filter through surrounding county court judgements and whether Lender & Court Services could assist clients affected by them. To help meet that demand and allow the business to cash in on an opportunity, Memory and his team set about developing another service to help these individuals too.
Outlining the steps that the firm took next, Memory explained: “We now assist clients in communicating with the County Court Business Centre, submitting court applications and drafting consent orders. The court system is weighed down by a large amount of legal terminology and is often not user-friendly, especially if the individual concerned does not have experience of the legal process.
“We help these individuals through this process, providing them with all the information and support they require. This can be a complex process where orders and directions are given by the court that a lay person wouldn’t fully understand. For individuals experienced with the court system, the process can be very straightforward, but the process is still incredibly time-consuming. We ensure that our clients’ details are presented in the correct legal manner, as incorrectly prepared court forms, witness statements or evidence can cause their application to be dismissed.”
Memory believes that this facet of the Lender & Court service is essential to the court system by helping it offset some of the high volume of cases that it finds itself having to process year-on-year.
“The court systems are often understaffed and overworked so our support is essential. Court employees do not have the time to provide the assistance that we do, and are not legally trained”, Memory said.
Another means through which Lender & Court helps ease the burden on the court system is by processing individuals who have been handed default judgements, meaning that they have been given a judgement due to non or late response to a claim form.
“In most cases, these judgements are handed out due to the court papers being sent to an old address”, Memory revealed.
“One of the biggest culprits for the issuing of these claims is parking enforcement companies who flood the court systems with such cases, and on this issue, we are pleased that MPs unanimously backed the proposals to create a fairer private parking system through The Parking Code of Practice Bill.”
Of course, solicitors’ firms do exist that take on the very same sorts of cases as Lender & Court, which begs the question as to why clients choose to approach them as opposed to a solicitor that can act directly for them. The answer to this in Memory’s view lies squarely in the fact that the more affordable self-help service is better suited to some clients’ needs.
Even more remarkably, Lender & Court is a unique player in the industry given that it is the only firm to offer this type of service at all.
“We are the only firm that offers this type of service for a fixed fee while maintaining our high success rate and strong client feedback”, Memory said.
“Furthermore, our modest size as a firm is advantageous in allowing us to offer a highly personalised service. We are always extremely flexible to meet the needs of everyone we support. Our ultimate aim is always to achieve the best result and so we will often spend more time on those with especially complex cases. Our clients are either unwilling to pay high fees or cannot afford them and so we provide a more cost-effective fixed-fee alternative to law firms that charge high hourly rates.
“We are very accessible and always willing to chat with people to understand their specific problems and needs. We pride ourselves on our openness and we are always ready to pick up the phone and talk to our clients and the claimants. As mediators we always aim to bring the two parties to a compromise, rather than having to proceed to court.”
Although the unique position of the business in the market and the allure of the service it provides has allowed Lender & Court Services to thrive over the last six years, Memory does not want to stop here. In fact, the next step for the company will be to explore different procedural fields of law to diversify the range of services that Lender & Court can offer.
“In the near future, I would like to diversify the services that we offer. By exploring different fields of law that are procedural, we will be able to help more people and reduce the cost for existing and future clients.
“Beyond our customers, we are also committed to continuing our support for newly qualified law graduates - a demographic that we always ensure we employ - helping them to begin their legal careers. If we can add additional services to our proposition, incorporating new areas of law, we are confident that we will be able to provide invaluable assistance to more people for a good value fee.”
As great as Memory’s ambitions might seem for the company, branching out in such a way is not unfamiliar territory with the firm having already successfully extended its services to cover county court judgements and gone from strength to strength by doing so. If Memory and his senior team can successfully guide Lender & Court Services into catering for other areas of law just as effectively, the stage is set for this unique firm to continue to thrive in years to come.
