GENERAL CLIENT SERVICE TERMS

• A partner will be assigned to take primary responsibility for seeing that your legal needs are met and for supervising all legal work we undertake on your behalf. The responsible partner will also determine the appropriate additional staffing for each matter you entrust to us. Lawyers and other legal professionals will be assigned to assist with each matter on the basis of their experience and expertise, the nature and scope of the issues and the time constraints imposed by the situation.
• We are always pleased to discuss the staffing of a particular transaction or other matter with you.

• The scope of our role for each specific matter you entrust to us will be confirmed in continued communications between us as work progresses. We will not expand the scope of our engagement without instructions from you. In particular, we will not advise you in respect of the tax aspects of a matter unless it is specifically agreed that tax services will be included in the engagement.
• Our role is to provide legal advice and legal services to you. Although we will use every effort to help you achieve your financial and business objectives for any transaction or other matter, you should rely on your internal experts or other external advisors for financial and business advice.
• We will accept instructions from anyone within your organization who has apparent authority in connection with the matter at hand, unless you instruct us otherwise.

• We have clients who rely upon us for general representation and clients to whom we provide representation regarding discrete matters. It is possible that an adverse relationship may exist or may develop in the future between you and another of our clients.
• In retaining us, you consent and agree that we may represent other clients (some of whom may be engaged in business activities competitive to yours) on matters that may be considered adverse to you or your interests, so long as we have not been engaged by you on the specific matter for which the other client seeks representation. Furthermore, you agree that you will not assert that our representation of you constitutes a basis for disqualifying us from representing another client in any such matter.
• However, be assured that we have comprehensive policies and procedures in place for the creation and maintenance of “ethical walls”, when required, between the firm’s lawyers representing clients whose matters may be adverse in interest. In common with our treatment of the confidential information of all of our clients, at no time will any of your confidential information be disclosed to or used for the benefit of any other client.

• As far as the level of fees is concerned, we charge in accordance with the Advocates Remuneration Order, which prescribes the fees payable for the variety of work that the advocates are called upon to perform for the clients from time to time. Of course, as is increasingly happening nowadays, our firm is always willing to negotiate and agree on fees payable for the work that may be entrusted to us prior to the commencement of a legal assignment.
• We reserve the right to ask for money on account in respect of work to be conducted on your behalf. This may help to avoid delay in the progress of your case. When we put these payments towards your bill/s, we will send you a receipted bill. However, please note that your total charges and expenses maybe greater than any advance payments.
• It is important that you understand that the amount of our costs, which you will have to pay, may be greater than the amount you can recover from another party to the case. If we are acting for a limited company, we reserve the right to look to the directors personally for settlement of this firm’s invoices in the event that the limited company goes into liquidation or receivership.
• On specific matters e.g. arbitration, our fees are generally based on the time spent by lawyers and others on your behalf, and are charged at hourly rates. Our hourly rates are adjusted periodically to reflect experience, capability and seniority of our professionals and staff, as well as general economic factors. At your request, the responsible partner may provide you with more specific details on our rates. Although time expended is a significant factor in determining our fees, there may be circumstances in
  which our final fee takes into account other factors, including:

i. The experience, reputation and abilities of those rendering our services;
ii. The amount at issue;
iii.Particularly favourable results obtained;
iv. Time limitations imposed by you or by the circumstances of the matter; and
v. Whether working on the matter will preclude or limit us from rendering services to other clients.

• Our fees will not be affected by the failure of a transaction to be completed.
• VAT is charged in addition to these fees. We will add VAT to any other expenses incurred, including payments we make on your behalf.
• Generally, our accounts are issued monthly. All of our accounts are due and payable on receipt. If an account is not paid within 30 days, we may charge interest at an annual rate in accordance with the rules that govern the professional conduct of lawyers, from the date the account is issued until the date paid.
• In addition to our professional fees, our accounts will include disbursements incurred by us on your behalf, such as long-distance telephone charges, photocopying and facsimile charges; charges for courier, messenger and other communication services; computer database access; charges for legal research; travel expenses; necessary non-legal staff overtime incurred on your behalf; postage; filing fees paid to government agencies; and other out-of-pocket costs incurred on your behalf. For larger disbursements, we may seek funds from you in advance or forward invoices to you for direct payment.
• You will be responsible for payment of the fees and disbursements of other law firms retained by us on your behalf to provide advice on the laws of other jurisdictions. In addition, the fees and disbursements of experts or other third-party service providers retained by us on your behalf will be your responsibility. These experts’ or other service providers’ fees and disbursements may be billed to you directly, or we may forward their invoices to you for direct payment by you to them.

• In the course of acting for you, you may disclose to us (and we may collect, use and disclose) personal information that is subject to applicable privacy protection laws. We will collect, use or disclose that personal information for the sole purpose of providing our services to you.

• When we are engaged to act on behalf of an organization, our obligations are to that organization and not the directors, officers, employees or other agents who retain us and provide us with instructions or to whom we may provide advice.
• In accordance with the rules that govern the professional conduct of lawyers, if we have any evidence of wrong-doing by or on behalf of the organization, or any officer, director, employee or agent of the organization, we may be obligated to report the wrong-doing to appropriate senior officers or directors of the organization.
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• We may communicate with you and provide documents to you through various forms of electronic communications, including email through the
  public Internet. You may also correspond or provide documents to us through electronic means. Those electronic communications may contain information or documents that are confidential or privileged, unless you instruct us not to send such information or documents electronically.
• There is a risk that any such electronic communications may be intercepted or interfered with by third parties or may contain computer
  viruses. In addition, we employ filtering techniques (e.g., anti-spam software) which might interfere with the timely delivery of electronic communications you send to us. Neither of us will be responsible to the other, nor have any liability for any actions of any third parties, with respect to electronic communications either of us might send the other, or for any delay or non-delivery, or other damage caused in connection with an electronic communication.
• If you would prefer that any correspondence or documents sent to you be transmitted with a greater degree of certainty or protection (e.g., encryption), please let us know. In addition, if you have any concerns or doubts about the authenticity or timing of any electronic communication purportedly sent by us, please contact us immediately.

• You may terminate your engagement of us for any reason by giving us written notice to that effect. On such termination, all unpaid legal fees and disbursements become immediately due and payable, whether or not an account for them has yet been issued.
• We may stop performing legal services and terminate our legal representation of you for any reason in accordance with the rules that govern the professional conduct of lawyers, including for unanticipated conflicts of interest or unpaid legal fees and disbursements.
• Unless our engagement has been previously terminated, our representation of you will cease upon the issuance by us of our final account
  for services to you. If, upon termination or completion of a matter, you wish to have any documentation returned to you, please advise us. Otherwise, any documentation that you have provided to us and the work product completed for you will be dealt with in accordance with our records retention program. Please note that for various reasons, including the minimization of unnecessary storage expenses, we reserve the right to destroy or dispose of this documentation.
• After completing any particular matter, changes may occur in the applicable laws or regulations, or their interpretation, that could affect your current or future rights, obligations and liabilities. We have no continuing obligation to advise you with respect to future legal developments, unless we are specifically engaged to do so after the completion of the matter at hand.
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• At the conclusion of your case we will keep all files and documents relating to the same for the time as required by Statute at no cost to yourself. Thereafter they may be destroyed unless you have asked us to keep them in our possession.
• If we retrieve papers or documents from storage in relation to continuing or new instructions to act in connection with your affairs, we will not normally charge for such retrieval. However, we may make a charge based on time spent producing stored papers or documents to you or another at your request.
• We may also charge for reading, correspondence or other work necessary to comply with the instructions given by you or on your behalf.