Closed CLC Practices (File Requests)

There are three main reasons why a Practice may close down

• Voluntarily – (such as retirement) in which case arrangements will be made with the client before the Practice closes. In the majority of cases the Practice will complete any work already started but in others the lawyer may have an arrangement with another Practice to take over any unfinished work. If this is the case your lawyer will contact you to advise you of the arrangements and give you the opportunity to choose to instruct another lawyer if you prefer. If you choose the latter option you must expect to pay a proportion of the agreed fee to the closing Practice. The amount would depend upon the stage that the transaction had reached.
• Due to bad health or death – This is most likely to affect Practices that have only one qualified person carrying out the work. If you find your firm has closed due to this reason, please contact The CLC who will have made arrangements for the work to be covered by another Practice in the short term. You will have the choice of leaving your file with the CLC nominated Practice or you will be able to move the work to a lawyer of your choice. Again, if you choose the latter option you must expect to pay a proportion of the agreed fee to the closing Practice.
• Intervention – If The CLC has intervened and closed the practice themselves, you will need to contact The CLC who will explain the process which will be similar to that described above.

Requesting your file that was held by a closed practice

The Land Registry can provide you with the title registration and title plans for most properties for around £20-£30 depending on your request. These are the documents that you are most likely to need from your purchase file so you might find it easier and quicker to speak to the Land Registry before you come to us.

However, if you still wish to request other documents that were held by a CLC regulated practice that has now been closed down, please complete this form and email it to filerequest@clc-uk.org and we will be able to confirm whether we hold them.

To request a file from us we require you provide certified proof of your identity and we recommend you arrange this before submitting the request.

• We may make a charge of £50.00 per file to cover the costs of retrieving such files from storage and sending the file to you by recorded delivery.
• Following receipt of your ID and payment, it can take up to three weeks to obtain your file.
• If the file is stored electronically, it will be sent to you on an unencrypted USB via recorded delivery. We will require your consent to send you your file via this method.
• The file may not contain all of the documents you require and we do not check for any specific document the requester is asking for. The only checks the CLC will make on a file is that it is sent to the rightful owner.