The public overpaid lawyers by nearly £500 million last year for legal services, according to a report published today.
Lawyers do not publicise their charges and the public fail to shop around for the best deal, the report by the Competition and Markets Authority said.
Its year-long study found that there was not enough information on price, quality and service to help people who need legal advice. “Obtaining the right service at good value can therefore be challenging as consumers can face wide variations in the cost of similar services,” it said. “They can also struggle to find enough information to help them identify their legal need.”
In its report, the authority said that 17 per cent of lawyers publicised charges and that 22 per cent of people compared services first. It accused solicitors of charging a wide range of prices for the same basic legal services and cited research that found that the price for a complex divorce with a dispute over assets could vary from £1,260 to £3,000.
The authority urged the Legal Services Board to force law firms and legal services providers to publish easily understandable rates for specific services.
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Robert Bourns, president of the Law Society, which represents solicitors in England and Wales, said: “Regulation can be a blunt instrument. Where possible solutions driven by consumer demand are more flexible and less costly.”