Britannia Conveyancing Panel Information

The answer to this question really depends on the reason that your firm has been removed off the Britannia conveyancing panel. The top 3 reasons are as follows:

1. lack of transactions
2. the lawyer is a sole practitioner
3. as part of the HSBC panel reduction.

In these three circumstances it is unlikely that you would expected to take any action. Disclosure and other compliance considerations are more likely to be relevant if the reason for removal is due to breaches of lender requirements or allegations of fraud or negligence. Whether the reasoning should trigger a disclosable 'material' breach will depend on the firm and the circumstances around possible failures to comply with the SRA Authorisation Rules, and the SRA will judge each case on its own merits. Factors such as the detriment or risk of detriment to clients, the scale of the issue and overall impact on the firm will need to be considered in deciding whether a failure is 'material'. As the COLP you will need systems to identify patterns of breaches. Even if you don't consider there to be regulatory implications the firms COFA should give some thought to whether she/he needs to take any action as result of being removed from the Britannia conveyancing panel.

You need to be careful here as what you are proposing may not be acceptable to the mortgage company. It is possible that you (as a non-panel firm) or the mortgage applicant are not at liberty instruct a panel firm of your choice. Lenders such as Nationwide BS make it clear to their panel firms that where a non-panel member firm is instructed by one of their mortgage applicants, the lender will appoint a panel firm to carry out its instructions and to liaise with the borrower's conveyancing firm. You also need to make the costs implications and potential for delay very clear to your client.

With banks and solicitors working so closely with one another it is surprising that there has not been greater demand for the introduction of a bit of transparency regarding not just the figures for the Britannia conveyancing panel but for all lender panel listings

6 potential conveyancing clients attempt to locate a conveyancing practitioner on the Britannia panel every 4 weeks in Hendon. Feel free to contact the Lexsure team who will tell how your firm can be identified by those searching for conveyancing in Hendon.

You should provide details of the date of removal, information on the reason for removal, date of appeal and any reason given for reinstatement. This should not negatively affect your application but gives the Law Society viability as to what has occured.

You need to communicate with Britannia to obtain standard documents. The CML Handbook has an express inquiry for lenders to cite who to contact to obtain standard documents. Britannia in their Part 2’s state: You will need to quote the firm’s Britannia solicitors panel reference.