Non-reserved business legal services
Contracts, terms, employment documents, unpaid invoices and getting a dispute organised — that is the large majority of what a business actually needs, and it is what we do at a fixed price. The handful of jobs the law reserves to a regulated firm go to Robert at RHF Solicitors. This page tells you exactly where that line falls, before you spend anything.
Most legal work a growing business needs is not dramatic. It is a contract that arrived on a Friday, a set of terms that has not been updated since the business was half its size, a first employee starting in three weeks, or an invoice that is ninety days late. None of it needs a courtroom. All of it costs money when it is left.
The usual options handle it badly, and it is worth being precise about why. A high-street firm charges by the hour, which does something specific to your behaviour: it makes the five-minute question expensive, so you stop asking it and sign anyway, and the firm only ever meets your problem once it is big enough to justify the bill. A template website sells you a document with nobody standing behind it and no idea whether it fits how you actually trade. Doing nothing works right up until it does not.
Buzz Legal exists for the space in between, and the difference is in four concrete things. You get a scope and a price in writing before anything starts, and nothing begins until you have approved both — a contract review is £249 +VAT whether it takes an hour or four, and at the £200 to £350 +VAT hourly rates commonly quoted to small businesses, that is roughly what an hour buys. You get the answer in language you can act on, because a document you do not understand cannot protect you. You get told which side of the regulated line your matter falls on at the scoping stage, not halfway through. And you get a service that would rather turn work away than take a job it should not have.
There is a trade-off, and it belongs here rather than in the small print. Because we are not an SRA-regulated firm, our own work does not carry the SRA compensation fund, compulsory solicitors' professional indemnity arrangements, or a route to the Legal Ombudsman. What it carries instead is a published complaints procedure and a solicitor at an authorised firm for everything the law reserves. Where the stakes justify full regulatory protection across the whole matter, use a regulated firm — and we will tell you when we think that is the case rather than wait for you to work it out.
We sit alongside Buzz Accounting and Buzz Financial Services, so the legal, financial and tax sides of a decision can be joined up instead of handled by three people who never speak to each other. It matters more often than it sounds: a shareholder agreement has tax consequences buried in its leaver provisions, and whether someone is a contractor is a legal question and a tax question at the same time.
Buzz Legal Ltd is not a firm of solicitors and is not regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority. We provide non-reserved legal services. That is a real legal category, not a hedge, and it is worth understanding what it means for you.
Under the Legal Services Act 2007, six activities are “reserved” — they can only be carried out by a person or firm authorised to do them:
Everything else — drafting and reviewing contracts, writing terms and conditions, employment documents, staff handbooks, privacy notices, shareholder agreements, chasing unpaid invoices, letters before action, getting a dispute organised before proceedings — is not reserved. Anyone can do it. The only question that matters is whether whoever does it is any good and stands behind it.
That is the work Buzz Legal does, and we are direct about the consequences. Because we are not an SRA-regulated firm, you do not have the protections that come with using one: no SRA compensation fund, no compulsory solicitors' professional indemnity arrangements, and complaints about our own work do not go to the Legal Ombudsman. Our complaints procedure explains what we do instead and where else you can go.
Reserved legal activities for Buzz Legal clients are carried out by RHF Solicitors, which is authorised and regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA no. 324115). If your matter needs a solicitor, you get one — with all the regulatory protection that carries, including the Legal Ombudsman and the SRA.
We tell you this at the scoping stage, before you have committed to anything or spent any money. It is not a discovery halfway through a job. If a matter looks contentious or court-bound when it lands, we say so on day one.
Nothing on this website is legal advice on your situation. The guides and articles here are general legal information, written to help you work out what you are dealing with. Advice comes when you engage us and we know the facts.
Most of what Buzz Legal does never needs a solicitor. The reason to have one anyway is the day something does — a claim threatened, a tribunal date, a settlement agreement that only waives anything once the employee has taken independent advice. Robert handles that side through RHF Solicitors, an authorised firm regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA no. 324115).
For you that is worth two things. You are not paying solicitor rates for work that does not legally require a solicitor. And on the day it does, you are not ringing round strangers with a deadline already running: the person picking it up has seen the file, and the preparation goes with it rather than being paid for twice.
If you cannot understand a document, it cannot protect you. Every piece of work comes with an explanation of what it does, which clauses are doing the heavy lifting and how to use it — written the way a person would say it out loud.
Defined jobs are quoted as a fixed fee agreed in writing before anything starts: £249 +VAT for a contract review, £695 +VAT for a set of business terms. If something genuinely falls outside that scope we stop and re-quote. You are never billed for work you did not approve.
Almost every expensive legal problem we see started as a cheap one that nobody looked at. We would rather spend an hour on your terms now than a month on the dispute they would have prevented.
Turning work away is part of doing this honestly. If a matter belongs with a solicitor, an accountant or a specialist, you hear that at the scoping stage before you have spent anything — not halfway through a job we should not have taken.
Buzz Legal Ltd provides non-reserved legal services. Reserved legal activities are carried out by RHF Solicitors, authorised and regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA no. 324115).
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No. Buzz Legal Ltd is not a firm of solicitors and is not regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority. That is a deliberate position rather than an oversight. We provide non-reserved legal services, which is a real category under the Legal Services Act 2007 and covers most of what a growing business needs: contracts, terms and conditions, employment documents, handbooks, privacy notices, shareholder agreements, debt chasing and dispute preparation. Six activities are reserved to authorised firms and we do none of them. Robert Festenstein is a qualified solicitor, but he acts through RHF Solicitors, a separate authorised firm regulated by the SRA (no. 324115). If you want a solicitor from the outset, say so and we will take you straight there.
Everything outside the six reserved activities. In practice: reviewing a contract before you sign it and marking up the clauses worth arguing about; drafting client, supplier and consultancy agreements and NDAs; writing terms and conditions that actually bind because they are put in front of the customer at order stage; employment contracts, written statements of particulars, handbooks and disciplinary and grievance procedures; privacy notices and data processing agreements that describe what your systems genuinely do; shareholder and founder agreements including deadlock and leaver provisions; and chasing unpaid invoices, including statutory interest and letters before action. That is the majority of the legal work a growing business ever needs, and none of it requires a regulated firm.
We tell you at the scoping stage, before you have spent anything, and hand it to RHF Solicitors. The trigger is usually one of three things: the matter is reserved, such as a court claim, conveyancing or probate; it is already contentious, with solicitors instructed on the other side or proceedings threatened; or a document needs a solicitor's involvement to work at all — a settlement agreement only waives statutory claims once the employee has taken advice from a relevant independent adviser. Because RHF is already connected to Buzz Legal, the handover is not a cold referral: whoever picks up the reserved side has seen the file, and any preparation goes with it rather than being repeated.
Not in the way you would be with a solicitor, and you should decide with that in front of you. Using a provider that is not SRA-regulated means no SRA compensation fund, no compulsory solicitors' professional indemnity arrangements, and no route to the Legal Ombudsman for complaints about our own work. What you get instead is our complaints procedure: acknowledgement within five working days, a substantive response within twenty working days, and a review by a senior person who was not involved if that response does not settle it. Data complaints can go to the ICO at any time on 0303 123 1113. Work carried out by RHF Solicitors carries the full protection that applies to a regulated firm.
Robert is a solicitor and Head of Legal, and he handles the reserved legal work for Buzz Legal clients through RHF Solicitors, an authorised firm regulated by the SRA (no. 324115). The distinction matters: when he acts on a reserved matter he does so as a solicitor at a regulated firm, with the regulatory protections that carries, rather than as part of Buzz Legal Ltd. The practical effect is that everyday work stays fast and inexpensive, and if a matter becomes a court claim or a tribunal, the solicitor picking it up has already seen the file rather than being found in a hurry once the deadline is running.
You should not simply take our word for it, so here is what to test. Ask who is doing the work and under whose regulation, and expect a straight answer. Ask for the scope and the price in writing before anything starts — you get both, and nothing begins until you have approved them. Ask what would move your matter to a solicitor, and expect that to be named before you spend money rather than discovered halfway through. Read the regulatory position above and our complaints procedure, both of which say plainly what you do not get. If a provider is vague on any of that, that is your answer, regulated or not.
Yes. Enquiry details, documents and correspondence are handled under UK GDPR: general enquiries are kept for up to 12 months, prospective client records for up to 24 months, and client files for typically six years after the relationship ends. Data is shared only where there is a real reason — our own team and advisers, our IT and hosting providers, and RHF Solicitors or another authorised firm where a matter is handed over. This website sets no cookies and runs no analytics. One point to be aware of: legal professional privilege is a separate question from confidentiality and is not something we can assume applies to advice that does not come from a qualified lawyer, so if privilege matters, raise it at the outset.
If you are already in a fight — solicitors instructed on the other side, a claim issued, a tribunal date — start with a solicitor rather than with us. If you want the reassurance of the SRA compensation fund and the Legal Ombudsman across everything, use a regulated firm, because we cannot give you that on our own work. If your matter is conveyancing, probate, immigration, criminal or personal rather than business, we are not the right place. And if what you actually want is the cheapest possible document with nobody standing behind it, a template site will beat us on price, and we would rather say so than sell you something you will not value.
Clear scope · fixed fees available. Buzz Legal Ltd is not a firm of solicitors and is not regulated by the SRA.