solicitor

paralegal

family law paralegal

case worker

family solicitor

Duncan-Lewis-Solicitors

Poor retention of staff due to poor management.

The immigration department is very bad and this fact is well known amongst other immigration law firms. There is a lot of office politics and back stabbing going on. There is a lot of favouritism and a lot of emphasis on billing over quality of the work.

There are a few good solicitors here but the majority are people working in the hope of getting a training contracting with the intention of leaving soon after. This means there are not a lot of good quality experienced solicitors but mainly paralegals and trainees. Unfortunately their training especially in the immigration department is not very good because billing is a priority.

The Directors and CEOs have their own agenda. They do not like independent people so if you excel at what you do expect to face obstacles. 

There was a whole website dedicated to disgruntled former employees but this has since been removed from the web as it was causing them bad publicity. However that says a lot about what they are really like. A good law firm would not have a website like that in existence.

There are two things that make working at Duncan Lewis bearable for about a year or so: great colleagues and the name of the firm looks somehow good on your CV (if you happen to be in the right department). Everything else is terrible. You will learn a great deal of stuff if your supervisor and director are good and care about providing quality training and supervision. You will be given plenty of responsibilities if you are good and you will have almost complete conduct over cases if you accredit under the Law Society accreditation schemes. You will get to represent very vulnerable clients and really make a difference to their lives. However, employees are exploited, not paid fairly and not trusted. Everything that is management related, HR or IT are a nightmare to deal with. No flexible working, study leave, TOIL or any other form of support provided without your salary being pro rata-ed straight away. A lot of caseworker and trainees are also law students and this sort of flexibility is essential for them.  Boost your CV with experience but leave before you burn out.

The only guaranteed pro is that the people you will meet. If you're lucky, you will be put under a supervisor who is keen to teach and give you a positive learning experience.

Previously it used to be the case that you would get great exposure to various areas of law during your training. including a mix of legal aid and private work. However, new trainees will only be exposed to one area with three different names for the same.

Training varies vastly. You could be either spoon fed information until you lack any sort of initiative or thrown into the deep end and asked to do a hearing you have no knowledge of.

I worked as a marketing assistant at Duncan Lewis where I was part of a sincerely supportive team. I was given one-on-one training whenever I requested this. The work is important and meaningful so it is excellent work to market. The marketing team is a growing department so new ideas and projects are always heard and welcomed. The firm does not feel hierarchical and you can approach even the most senior managers for questions and support. The firm is extremely diverse so it is difficult not to fit in.  

I enjoy helping clients, the workload, and researching. However, there are severe issues regarding Office Politics, very poor salary, non-existent benefits, and (in my experience) poor supervision.

I have made some excellent friends here, and enjoy the work, and I believe that working in DL immigration department has made me a better person. However, terrible supervision and unrealistic targets set by HR make it a hard place to work for a long period of time.

I undertook varied administrative tasks and assisted the Immigration, Family and Public Law departments on a daily basis.

I understood how important the chronology of documents and being organised were the key to running an office smoothly.

I learned how to manage my time and prioritise my work loads to tight deadlines. 

My colleagues were really helpful and keen to advise me where necessary and extremely approachable.

A typical day is 9.30 - 5.30. Each office is very different,  staff are generally expected to maintain their own caseload and undertake their own admin.
Staff are expected to perform a certain amount of chargeable hours a day. 
People are friendly and organise social events between themselves.
The best part of the job is feeling like you are assisting a client and the worst part is the volume of work.

Typical day included organising client files, on pager and on a computer system. At time assisting in client interviews, shadowing solicitors. Submitting documents to court, which required the preparation of file bundles prior to this.

It's difficult enough to keep on top of each and every client when you have a new one thrown at you every week but you also have to account for 6 hours of work on a daily basis with justification as to why it took you that long. It can be tedious but if you take the numbers away from the job, it is interesting and satisfying knowing you're helping individuals on a personal level.

I loved my job as it was a great experience to have and everyone was friendly and very supportive to me. As I didn't know anyone and everyone approach me, being really friendly and if I had any issues or unsure of something to not hesitate to ask. I loved going to the Family Court to hand over documents to different solicitors as I've never been to a court.

Top Job Titles	Average salary
Solicitor 82 salaries reported	£54,646 per year
Paralegal 20 salaries reported	£23,138 per year
Family law paralegal 9 salaries reported	£22,956 per year
Case worker 12 salaries reported	£22,800 per year
Family solicitor 21 salaries reported	£57,798 per year

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