Freedom to decide your hours,
income and work-life balance
Why become a consultant solicitor at Setfords?
- The largest and most established fee-share firm in the UK
- 300+ national lawyer network
- Most comprehensive support structure with 100+ staff
- Millions in work generated in-house for our lawyers
- Market-leading tech platform
- Award-winning model
Setfords is a UK 200 firm
The firm has entered into the top 200 for the first time, after an impressive 63% rise in revenue in just 2 years. The firm received over a thousand applications from new lawyers in the last year alone.
The benefits of consultancy at Setfords
Uncapped
earning potential
Work-life balance determined by you
Work from
anywhere
Award-winning
100+ support staff
Choose your own
hours and clients
A national network
of 300+ lawyers
How much can I earn as a consultant solicitor?
Bill £160k
earn
£100k
Bill £290k
earn
£200k
Bill £413k
earn
£300k
Our fee structure is about honouring our commitment to you, giving you the rewards you deserve. At a traditional firm you might expect to take home a third of your billings, at Setfords it can be up to 80%.
Salary calculator
A day in the life of a consultant lawyer at Setfords
Frequently asked questions
Many lawyers that move from traditional firms to consultancy do so because they want to be able to provide their existing clients a better level of service. If you’ve built good relationships with your clients, then more often than not they will follow you. Making the move to consultancy is a smoother transition if you have a client network already established. This allows you to hit the ground running and won’t leave you wondering what to do when getting started.
However, unlike many other consultancy firms, Setfords invests heavily in lead generation activities to help supplement lawyers with leads and also help lawyers develop their own marketing activities in order to generate new clients. In the past 12 months our Business Development & in-house Marketing teams have helped generate over £3m of new business for our consultants.
Our pioneering fee-share structure acknowledges achievement – the more you bill the greater the rewards. Setfords offers market leading remuneration to our consultants with up to 80% of billings once you hit over £200,000. To find out what you could be earning as a consultant lawyer at Setfords use our salary calculator.
The support structure at Setfords is not just about meeting the needs of our consultant solicitors but going far beyond their expectations. We have dedicated over 10 years to building the biggest and best support team in the industry and, because we understand one size does not fit all, we tailor this support to suit individuals and teams. Our consultant solicitors can focus on their clients because they know our 60+ strong team will look after everything else. Our support structure includes:
- Business Development & Marketing
- Admin, Secretarial & Compliance
- Management & Legal support
- Technical & IT
One of the biggest fears when entering consultancy is that you might find yourself isolated not knowing what direction to head in. Fortunately, we believe in building a united, internal network amongst our lawyers. You will find various opportunities through cross-reference work with larger projects and tenders often requiring multiple consultants to team up and share expertise.
A business plan and entrepreneurial spirit will be essential along with the dedication to building your network is the key to success as a consultant solicitor. The main benefit is that you get to do it all your way. You can pursue the clients you want to work with, in your own time, however you feel most comfortable.
Yes. There are many reasons people apply to become consultant solicitors, but the primary one is because they want to take control of their working life. Whatever your circumstances, we are interested in speaking to you. We have spent more than 10 years perfecting remote-working, and we can help you embrace a new way of delivering legal services.
Yes. We can discuss consultancy over the phone or through video chat. Our IT department can set you up remotely and we have an online induction programme which includes full training on all our systems. Agreements can be signed with electronic signatures.
- The vast majority of our 70-plus office-based staff are now working remotely, but all have been provided with all the necessary equipment to continue to carry out their work and to support our lawyers.
- All incoming mail is uploaded to our case management system.
- The bulk of legal documentation can be sent out by email, and we have a team of secretaries to assist with this.
- Essential documents can still be sent by post by our skeleton team at Head Office.
- We have access to an electronic signature service, further reducing the need for clients to post documents.
- We have conference and video-calling facilities which allow us to hold online meetings and discussions.
- We have implemented a wellbeing programme to ensure our teams feel supported in their new working environment, ensuring they can continue to deliver the same high level of service to our clients.
Our lawyers are paid when the firm has been paid by the client and we do not restrict how frequently you can invoice us for your share of the fees.
Join our national network
As a consultant solicitor at Setfords you don’t have to manage teams, but you can be part of one. Our consultant solicitors have access to more than 300 other lawyers across multiple disciplines. This gives our consultants the opportunity to better serve their clients because they can confidently cross-refer work to other highly talented lawyers. Our consultants also regularly work in teams to deliver pitches or handle large-scale projects.
Why choose Setfords for consultancy?
We have been established since 2006 and are one of the largest fee-share firms in the UK. Many firms with similar models only offer the bare minimum when it comes to support. Aside from the basics such as insurance, CMS and admin support, consultants are often left to generate their own work.
Setfords invests heavily in lead generation and has an award winning marketing and business development department which in the last year has helped generate an additional £3m worth of business for our consultant solicitors.
What to do next?
Whether you want to make the move now, in six months, or even in years to come, you can still get in touch to find out more. We are happy to chat in more detail about how working as a consultant can work for you, and answer any further questions you might have.
What our consultant solicitors say
“It’s great to see people coming on board and to see the excitement when they realise their lives are changing for the better.”
-Angie Dooling
“Proud to be part of such a wonderful firm. Cannot thank the support teams enough for all the work they do and cannot thank the rest of the teams who are always to hand to support you in whatever your need is.”
-Kiran Dhaliwal
“Since joining, I have been welcomed into a close-knit network of consultant lawyers based all over the country. It’s a great feeling being able to simply pick up the phone at any point during the day to mutually discuss your workload, details on cases or trade advice with like-minded professionals.”
-Jeffrey Gilbert
“I wish I had done this years ago. So happy working from home and cutting down travel and working in peace. I’m accessible over a longer period which is beneficial to clients and agents. The support staff are fantastic enabling us to provide a fast and efficient service. As it should be! Setfords were clearly set up for remote working and it is seamless regardless of COVID19. Very happy indeed.”
-Sue Cunningham-Sawyer
First-hand accounts from our lawyers
I became a consultant in lockdown – here’s what happened next
Sue Cunningham-Sawyer is one of over 50 lawyers who joined Setfords during the first 2020 lockdown. We spoke to her about her experience of switching to consultancy.
After twelve years in a traditional firm, I switched to consultancy and never looked back
I started working with Setfords as a consultant conveyancer in September 2019, after 12 years at a traditional, high street firm.
5 Reasons Why Becoming a Consultant Lawyer at Setfords Will Enhance Your Life
As working life is being revolutionised, now is the perfect time to consider your future as a lawyer. What if you really could have it all?
Take your first step today
