New Solicitors' Guideline Hourly Rates in effect from 1 January 2025

New Solicitors' Guideline Hourly Rates in effect from 1 January 2025.

The Solicitors’ Guideline hourly rates increased with effect from 1 January 2025. The rate increase of 3.65% was announced in December 2024 by Sir Geoffrey Vos, Master of the Rolls, to bring the rates in line with inflation.

In the December announcement, Sir Geoffrey Vos, Master of the Rolls, Head of Civil Justice and Chair of the CJC, said:

“In 2022 I requested that the Civil Justice Council take a strategic and holistic look at costs, particularly given the ongoing transformation of civil justice into a digital justice system. Following the recommendation to update Guideline Hourly Rates for inflation, in January 2024 figures were uplifted using the SPPI figures from Q1 2022 – Q1 2023 inclusive. This amounted to a 6.66% increase.

“These figures are now to be updated using more recent service producer price inflation (SPPI) values, to cover up to Q1 2024. This excludes provisional data from Q2 and Q3 2024 and amounts to an uplift of 3.65%.

“I would also like to highlight the ongoing work of the Civil Justice Council, who have established a working group to examine the issue of guidelines relating to Counsel’s fees, and a new top rate for complex commercial work and look forward to receiving its findings due course.”

The new Solicitors’ Guideline Hourly Rates in effect from 1 January 2025 are shown in the table, along with previous Solicitors' Guideline Hourly Rate updates which were in effect from 1 January 2024 and 1 October 2021 respectively. Prior to those dates, the first published Solicitors’ Guideline Hourly Rates came into effect on 19 April 2010.

Following the Guideline Hourly Rate increase, it is imperative that Solicitors and legal practitioners review retainers to ensure the retainer allows for the increased rates to be charged to clients, thus ensuring the indemnity principle is not breached. Clients must be properly advised if the hourly rates are to be increased. It is worth noting that these rates are guidelines and in complex cases it will be appropriate to charge higher hourly rates.

The Solicitors’ Guideline Hourly Rates vary depending on location and experience.

Grade A applies to solicitors and legal executives with over 8 years’ experience

Grade B applies to solicitors and legal executives with over 4 years’ experience

Grade C is in relation to other solicitors or legal executives and fee earners of equivalent experience

Grade D relates to trainee solicitors, paralegals and other fee earners

The location bands apply as follows:-

London 1 is for very heavy commercial and corporate work undertaken by centrally based London firms. It is not restricted to any particular London postcode.

London 2 City and Central London applies to the following postcodes:- EC1 to 4, W1, WC1, WC2 and SW1.

London 3 Outer London applies to all other London boroughs, plus Dartford and Gravesend.

National Band 1 applies to the following counties and cities:-

Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Dorset, Essex, Hampshire (and Isle of Wight), Kent, Middlesex, Oxfordshire, Suffolk, Surrey, Sussex, Wiltshire

Birkenhead, Birmingham (Inner), Bristol, Cambridge City, Cardiff (Inner),Leeds (Inner) (within 2km of City Art Gallery), Liverpool, Manchester (Central), Newcastle City (within 2m of St Nicholas Cathedral), Norwich City, Nottingham City and Watford.

National Band 2 applies to all places not included in London 1-3 or National Band 1.

The announcement also confirms the Solicitors’ Guideline Hourly rates will be uplifted annually by SPPI.

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