Professional Liability
William is developing a busy and varied professional liability practice. He regularly advises litigants, drafts pre-action correspondence and pleadings on their behalf, and represents them in court. His clients include solicitors, law firms, architects, engineers, financial advisers, property management companies, accountants, and auditors. During pupillage he gained experience of D&O claims.
Current and recent work includes:
Solicitors and law firms
- Advising, and drafting Particulars of Claim, in a High Court claim for nearly a million pounds arising from the alleged unsettlement of a claim relating to a major industrial accident. The claim is being brought against a well-known firm of claimant personal injury solicitors.
- Advising a firm of conveyancing solicitors accused of negligent delays which caused a client’s mortgage offer to lapse, causing financial loss.
- Drafting a defence for a firm of solicitors accused of having failed to protect their client’s position in a commercial lease renegotiation by making an application to court, with the alleged result that their client lost the opportunity to renew the lease.
- Advising a family law solicitor accused by a third party of negligently drafting a court order, which was then approved by a judge. The third party alleged that, as a direct consequence, he was arrested and became homeless.
- Advising a solicitors’ firm accused by a deceased person’s estate of having negligently failed to renew the insurance on the deceased person’s house, in circumstances where it knew (or ought to have known) that the house had a long history of subsidence.
- Advising a solicitor accused of having made errors during the negotiation of a commercial lease which caused six-figure consequential losses to their client.
- Advising a solicitor alleged to have given incorrect advice on the law of Stamp Duty Land Tax and its effect on a substantial commercial property transaction.
- Advising a solicitor accused of having negligently helped a client to alter their will, in circumstances where the solicitor allegedly ought to have suspected that the client lacked testamentary capacity.
- Advising an employment solicitor accused of having negligently missed a filing deadline, with the alleged result that the solicitor’s client lost the chance of bringing an employment tribunal claim.
- Advising a firm of personal injury solicitors accused of having negligently agreed to a full and final settlement of a client’s claim, in circumstances where they knew or ought to have known that a sizeable claim for credit hire losses was still outstanding.
Others
- Advising and representing a property management company accused of having negligently failed to comply with the law concerning tenancy deposit protection. The claim has not yet been listed for trial, but William recently secured a substantial costs order in favour of his client at an interim hearing.
- Advising and representing a firm of accountants alleged to have given incorrect advice to a company director in relation to a Director’s Loan Account.
- Advising and representing an accountant accused of having negligently failed to verify figures underlying a financial presentation to potential investors, with the alleged result that the potential deal collapsed.
- Drafting a Defence for a company that produces 3D Building Information Modelling of architectural designs, and has been accused of negligence and breach of contract by a former client.
- Advising a construction company on its counterclaim in negligence against an architect who was suing it for unpaid fees.
William is a member of the Professional Negligence Bar Association.
Selected Cases
View full profile »Awards
• Lord Denning Scholarship (Lincoln’s Inn, 2021)
• Senior Advocacy Scholarship (The University of Law, 2021)
• Lord Brougham Scholarship (Lincoln’s Inn, 2020)
Articles
News
Qualifications
• Bar Practice Course (Outstanding); The University of Law
• GDL (Distinction); The University of Law
• MA Music (First Class); King’s College, Cambridge
Memberships
- BILA
- COMBAR
- PIBA
- PNBA
- TECBAR
