Posted by nikitta to Student Associates, Northumbria on the 13th March 2012.

LawVest declare that they are "changing the way legal services are delivered".

They have recently unveiled Riverview Law, which is a fixed-price law firm operating through Riverview Solicitors and Riverview Chambers. They believe that attractive opportunities are being created by the structural, regulatory and commercial changes occurring in the legal market, since the Legal Services Act 2007. LawVest is to apply to become an alternative business structure (ABS) and has investment from global law firm DLA Piper.

Riverview Law offer businesses with up to 1,000 employees annual contracts from as little as £200 a month, for all their day-to-day legal support. Additionally, large organisations can outsource their in-house legal function to Riverview Law, also at a fixed price. They also offer fixed price quotes for particular pieces of work. The annual contracts provide unlimited access to legal advice and, because there is no hourly billing, Riverview claim to deliver price transparency and certainty on costs, allowing businesses to budget with confidence.

LawVest's chief executive Karl Chapman has said: “With Riverview Law we’re applying common sense business principles to a market that has been protected from real competition for too long. We have many advantages law firms don’t have; we started with a blank piece of paper, we spent time talking to businesses about what they want, and then we designed an operating and customer service model that delivers it – top customer support people, lawyers and legal assistants, combined with end-to-end technology and low overheads. Other law firms have already said to us that it won’t work because it is impossible to deliver comprehensive fixed pricing. Our response is simple: ‘Maybe you can’t deliver fixed pricing, but we can.’”

Many people may argue that innovative strategies such as this are vital in the changing legal environment, with many small high street firms and sole practitioners becoming increasingly worried that newly emerging changes will push them out of the legal market.

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