AGGRESSIVE INTER-SOLICITOR CORRESPONDENCE: PISTOLS AT DAWN & THE DANGERS OF TALKING ON TRAINS: LESSONS FROM TWITTER
Earlier this week I tweeted a link to earlier posts on this blog “aggressive correspondence”. The responses on Twitter make for interesting (and entertaining) reading. The legal Twitterati provide quite a few lessons here – from the art of brevity to the dangers of talking on trains.
99% of all correspondence should be met with nothing more than “thank you for your letter, the contents of which are noted”. Anything else is superfluous and pointless out-of-court moaning
Your post reminds me of advice given me by a QC to avoid adverbs as they just import unnecessary emotion, and that the most amount of emotion to show in a letter is mild surprise….
Opposition solicitor insisted on advising me of his “astonishment” every time we corresponded recently. It turned into a bit of an office meme. (Of course, I won, and remained resolutely unastonished)
“I have your letter dated x” is quite sufficient. And aggression etc never has to be met with a ‘thank you’.
My colleagues know that things are bad if I am surprised. If I am disappointed that is really seriously bad.
“ Dear Sirs, we are surprised to note that you….” “Dear Sirs, we are surprised by your surprise….”
Am I allowed to keep *your client’s defence is a tissue of lies*?
2 weeks ago was able to draft a letter that included: “We acknowledge receipt of your letter which was expected as Mr X was discussing the same loudly on the telephone on the train from London to Manchester on Wednesday”
I was once on a train and could hear two fellow lawyers discussing very loudly the mediation they were about to attend. I learnt all about the case!
The greatest piece of legal correspondence ever written : http://www.lettersofnote.com/2011/02/regarding-your-stupid-complaint.html?m=1 …
It’s a cracker, though my favourite remains: http://www.lettersofnote.com/2013/08/arkell-v-pressdram.html …
I once had someone complain to the firm I worked for, because I provided our counsel with an authority that showed they weren’t allowed to rely on WP correspondence
It was an ET costs hearing and wasn’t marked WPSATC.
Jenna Kisala Lawyers are intelligent people, they know what it means when you just leave off the kind and sign only regards. They know.
Paul Smith Don’t a lot of languages have subtleties that convey meaning? So you can imply “you, sir, are a moron” without actually saying it? Or is this a peculiarity of English?
Once had a sol threaten to obtain an arrest warrant for me if I didn’t answer his Qs. I wrote back asking him to state his authority & explain why I shouldn’t report him to the SRA blatantly making a threat he knew there was no lawful basis for. Weirdly he stopped the threats
Remember the good old days doing LVI cases. The words disgrace and fallacious were routine in correspondence
My old boss, Peter Trivass, was in the habit of ending letters to insurers with the encouragement ‘Pay up. Look big’
One of the Solicitors I handled work for as a Trainee had a habit of responding to long correspondence from the Defendant with:
Dear Sirs,
No.
Yours,
I’ve never known it impress a judge. Besides, if you really want to be offensive, nothing beats ‘with the utmost possible respect…’
