Fixed fee solicitors: how to price fixed fees profitably

A fixed fee is a single agreed price for a defined piece of legal work, whatever time it takes. Clients like the certainty, and UK research shows fixed fees are now the norm in conveyancing. For the firm, it moves the risk of overrun onto the firm, so it only works when the scope is tight and the price comes from what similar matters actually cost to deliver.

This post is for firms that offer, or are thinking of offering, fixed fees. It is part of our series on law firm profit margins and what drives them, and it sits beside law firm pricing strategies, which compares fixed fees with the other models. It is operational guidance. What you must tell clients about costs, and how, is a matter for your COLP.

How do fixed fees work for solicitors?

The firm agrees a price for a defined service before the work starts. The client pays that price (plus disbursements and VAT, which should be stated) regardless of how long the work takes, as long as it stays within the agreed scope. If something outside the scope happens, the firm and the client agree a change, usually a further fixed fee or an hourly rate for the extra work.

Fixed fees are common for work that follows a predictable path:

• Residential conveyancing.
• Wills and lasting powers of attorney.
• Uncontested probate, often as a fixed fee or a fixed fee per stage.
• Uncontested divorce and some family stages.
• Employment settlement agreements and tribunal stages.
• Immigration applications.
• Straightforward debt recovery.
• Many motoring offence matters.

Are fixed fees common in UK law firms?

In consumer work, yes. The Legal Services Board's 2024 prices research (1,534 telephone interviews with providers, published June 2025) found fixed fees predominant in conveyancing, offered by as many as three-quarters of firms. As reported by the Law Gazette, providers offering fixed fees were on average cheaper than those using estimates: £1,100 against £1,246 for a freehold sale, and £795 against £1,181 for a divorce. 64% of fixed-fee firms said they very rarely or never ended up charging more than they quoted.

That last number is the point clients care about. A fixed fee sells certainty, and certainty is what an anxious first-time caller is really asking about when they ask "how much?".

What must a firm publish about its fixed fees?

For certain services offered to the public, the SRA Transparency Rules require firms to publish cost information on their website. Rule 1.5 requires the total cost or, where that is not practicable, the average cost or range; the basis of the charges, including any fixed fees; likely disbursements; VAT; and what the service includes and excludes, including key stages and timescales. Your COLP can confirm which of your services are covered. For how this shows up on enquiry calls, see SRA price transparency rules and enquiries.

The discipline those rules impose (stating what is included and excluded) is also the discipline that makes a fixed fee profitable. They are the same document.

How do you price a fixed fee without losing money?

Most firms that lose money on fixed fees priced them from the rate card or from a competitor's website. Neither tells you what the work costs your firm. Here is a method built from your own matters.

• Step 1. Define the service precisely. Name the steps, the documents and the number of client meetings or calls included.
• Step 2. Pull recent closed matters of that type. Twenty or more if you have them. Record actual time by grade.
• Step 3. Cost the time at fully loaded cost, not rate. Use cost per chargeable hour for each grade (see law firm cost structure).
• Step 4. Find the typical matter. Use the median, and look at how wide the spread is.
• Step 5. Decide what makes a matter atypical, and write those events into the scope as exclusions with their own price.
• Step 6. Add margin and a contingency, then compare with the market. If the market price is below your cost, the answer is to change how the work is done, not to match the price.
• Step 7. Review after every ten matters.

A worked example of fixed fee pricing

All numbers here are invented for illustration. A hypothetical firm wants to fix the price of an uncontested probate stage.

• Thirty past matters: median of 9 hours of solicitor time and 6 hours of paralegal time. The slowest quarter took over 16 solicitor hours.
• Loaded cost per hour: £140 for the solicitor, £75 for the paralegal.
• Cost of the median matter: (9 × £140) + (6 × £75) = £1,260 + £450 = £1,710.
• The slow matters all involved one of three things: a missing will original, a property abroad, or a dispute between beneficiaries. The firm writes those out of the fixed scope, each with its own price.
• Adding a 10% contingency and a target margin of 30% on cost: £1,710 × 1.1 × 1.3 ≈ £2,445.
• The firm publishes £2,450 plus VAT and disbursements, with a clear list of what is included and excluded.

Now compare that with the rate card approach. If the firm had multiplied the median hours by its hourly rates, it might have arrived at a similar number, but it would not have known that a quarter of matters would cost twice as much. The exclusions are what protect the margin.

What goes wrong with fixed fees?

The failure modes are predictable, and most of them are operational rather than pricing mistakes.

• Scope creep by phone. The client rings every few days for an update. Each call is ten minutes of fee-earner time the fixed fee never priced. Multiply by the length of the matter.
• Out-of-scope work done without saying so. A fee-earner does the extra work to be helpful and never raises the change. The firm absorbs it.
• No time recorded, so nobody can see which services are losing money.
• Senior people doing junior work. A fixed fee priced on paralegal time and delivered by a partner loses money every time.
• Price set once and never reviewed. Costs rise; the price stays still.

The first item is the one firms underestimate most. A client on a fixed fee has no reason not to call, and every call is unpaid time. Proactive updates at each stage cut the calls, because most calls are simply "where are we?". See matter updates for clients.

How do you handle work outside a fixed fee?

Agree the mechanism before the work starts, in writing:

• List the events that are outside scope.
• State what happens if one occurs: a further fixed fee, or hourly rates with an estimate.
• Tell the client as soon as it happens, before doing the extra work.
• Update the estimate. The SRA Code requires clients to receive the best possible information about likely overall cost, both at the start and as the matter progresses.

Fee-earners find this conversation awkward. A standard script and a standard letter make it routine. The script need not be long: what has happened, why it falls outside the agreed price, what the extra work will cost, and a question asking the client whether they want the firm to go ahead. Put the answer on the file. A change agreed in writing before the work is a change the client expects to pay; a change mentioned for the first time on the final bill is a dispute.

Should you still record time on fixed-fee matters?

I would. Not to bill it, but to learn. Without time records, you cannot tell whether a fixed fee is profitable, which fee-earners deliver it efficiently, or which exclusions you need. Report it separately so it does not inflate the WIP the firm expects to bill; there is more on that in what WIP means in a law firm and time recording in law firms.

What should you say about a fixed fee on the first call?

A fixed fee is a sales asset only if the person answering the phone can explain it. Enquirers who have seen a price on your website usually ring to check one thing: does it apply to me? The first call should answer that honestly, which means asking the questions that decide whether the matter is in scope.

A short structure that works for most fixed-fee services:

• Confirm the service. "It sounds like you need an uncontested probate application. Is that right?"
• Ask the scope questions. The ones that correspond to your exclusions: is there a will, is there property abroad, are the beneficiaries in agreement?
• State the price and what it includes, including disbursements and VAT, in plain words.
• Say what would change it, and that you would tell them before doing anything outside the price.
• Agree the next step and when it will happen.

Firms that do this well convert more enquiries and have fewer billing disputes later, because the scope conversation happened at the start, not halfway through the matter. The wider picture on turning enquiries into instructions is in how to grow a small law firm.

A checklist before you launch a fixed fee

• A written scope, with inclusions, exclusions and stages.
• A price built from your own matter data at loaded cost.
• A published price that meets the Transparency Rules, if the service is covered.
• A change mechanism, with a standard letter.
• A plan for regular client updates, so calls do not eat the margin.
• A review date.

Where does WasilX fit?

Fixed fees are won and lost on the first call, and protected or eroded by the calls that follow. Cam, our AI Engagement Coordinator, takes calls on the firm's line at any hour, says it is AI, asks the firm's own qualifying questions (including the ones that tell you whether a matter is in or out of scope), books the call back and sends the firm a summary. Each fee-earner's personal assistant covers their calls while they are in court and drafts matter updates for the fee-earner to approve. If fixed-fee work is where your margin goes, we would be glad to talk.

Frequently asked questions

What does a fixed fee solicitor mean? A solicitor or firm that charges one agreed price for a defined piece of work, rather than billing by the hour. Disbursements and VAT are usually shown separately.

Can a fixed fee change? The fee covers an agreed scope. If something outside that scope happens, the firm should tell the client before doing the extra work and agree the extra cost. Your terms of business set out how.

Are fixed fee solicitors cheaper? In the Legal Services Board's 2024 research on conveyancing, divorce and wills and probate, providers offering fixed prices were on average cheaper than those working to estimates.

Do solicitors have to publish fixed fees? For some services offered to the public, the SRA Transparency Rules require published cost information, including the basis of charges such as fixed fees. Your COLP can confirm which services apply.

How do you stop a fixed fee losing money? Price it from your own past matters at loaded cost, write clear exclusions, keep recording time to check it, and keep clients updated so they do not need to call.