About us

1. Payment of bills

Bills may be paid by credit card processed via www.tomalegal.co.uk.  Details of our bank accounts to which payments should be made appear on our bills or may be obtained from the Firm’s Accounts Department.

For all foreign exchange transactions, calculations and billing purposes, it is our practice to adopt mid-market closing exchange rates as published by the Bank of England.

Where minor exchange gains or losses arise as a result of our bills or disbursements paid on your behalf being settled in a currency other than the original billing currency, we will take such gains or losses to our profit and loss account.  We reserve the right, however, to claim any material exchange losses from you.

Foreign withholding tax:

If any tax or amounts in respect of tax must be deducted, or other deductions must be made, from any amounts payable to us, you will pay such additional amounts as may be necessary to ensure that we receive a net amount equal to the full amount we would have received had payment not been made subject to tax or any other deduction.

2. Disbursements and expenses

Disbursements:  while acting for you, we are likely to incur expenses on your behalf which will be itemised on your bill.  You agree to reimburse us for all usual costs, charges and other expenses reasonably incurred by us on your behalf or otherwise in connection with this matter.  These may include, for example, Counsel’s fees, Court fees, stamp duty and registration fees.  We will, of course, advise you in advance of any unusual expenses or charges and seek your approval before incurring them whenever practicable.

Expenses:  unless agreed otherwise, we will charge travel and subsistence expenses, transaction fees (including bank fees), courier fees, external copying and document production and other similar expenses necessarily incurred by the firm with third party providers in connection with this matter either at cost or at appropriate standard rates (which may include a fee or charge).  We charge for internal document production at our current rates which will be provided on request.  

We reserve the right to charge secretarial overtime and to seek reimbursement of the cost of late night travel arrangements where appropriate.

Telephone – international calls and significant mobile telephone expenses will be charged at cost, unless otherwise agreed.  The Firm may at its discretion charge a reasonable flat rate or lump sum to cover telephone calls made.

3. Client funds, payments on account and interest

Toma Legal does not provide banking services and we will accept and hold client funds only to the extent necessary to undertake professional services for you or to hold money on account of anticipated costs and expenses, including our own.

Unless we receive and agree specific instructions to the contrary, all client monies held by us will be deposited in our general client account or in an individual designated client account with Tide Bank in London. In the event of any bank default, we accept no liability but will assist clients to recover compensation from any applicable government financial protection scheme.  

Whenever we receive or hold money on your behalf for any reason, you agree that we may deduct from that money all sums that are due to us in respect of costs and expenses which have been incurred and/or invoiced to you on that matter and on any other matter upon which we are instructed by you.

Interest will be calculated at the rate set by the Bank of England. That, of course, may change. The period for which interest will be calculated will run from the date(s) when funds are received by us until the dates of any payment to a third party or re-payment to you, and, if it is a positive balance will be paid when it is fair and reasonable and when the calculated interest exceeds a de minimis amount of £20. In the event of a negative balance we will require you to reimburse us for any charges for which we become liable.

4. Information: disclosure and confidentiality

We will hold in strict confidence any confidential information obtained regarding you and your business and we will not disclose it to others without your permission except as may reasonably be necessary for the purposes of providing our services or as permitted or required by statute or regulation.

Our work may require us to give information to third parties such as expert witnesses and other professional advisers.

As regards confidentiality and disclosure you agree and recognise that:

(a) We may hold or obtain confidential information about another client or prospective client or its business which might reasonably be expected to be material to the matter or matters upon which we are advising you.  Just as we respect and will uphold our duty of confidentiality to you, you accept that we will owe you no duty to disclose such information about another client or prospective client or its business.  This will be so even where your interest is adverse to it.

(b) Where we hold confidential information about you or your business, we shall not be precluded from acting or continuing to act for another client or prospective client or its business where that information might reasonably be expected to be material to it and it has an adverse interest to you provided that it is reasonable for us to act in those circumstances and that all proper steps are taken by us to ensure that confidential information about you and your business is safeguarded, protected and not disclosed.

We reserve the right to disclose our files to regulatory bodies in the exercise of their powers to meet legal and regulatory compliance requirements.  We reserve the right to disclose files to our auditors who will, at all times, respect client confidentiality.

We also reserve the right to disclose, when necessary, our files and those of our clients to our professional indemnity insurers and to provide information to our insurance brokers in relation to these communications with insurers.  Both our professional indemnity insurers and brokers are regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and take such steps as necessary to protect our clients' confidentiality. To provide services to you and to manage our international client relationships, we may share your information with other Toma Legal network firms.

If we are required for any reason (whether during the course of a matter or after it has terminated) compulsorily to disclose documents or to give information orally or in writing relating to a matter or your affairs pursuant to a Court order, notice or demand served by an entity or person with the authority to compel such disclosure, then we shall comply. If any documents or information are subject to legal professional privilege, if possible we will let you know and advise you of the opportunity to claim privilege.  Unless you confirm any claim to privilege, we reserve the right to treat it as waived.  Should you decide to claim privilege, we shall be entitled to charge for time incurred by us and any disbursements.

Toma Legal utilises cloud-based platforms to deliver some of our services to you. Our data stays within the UK in locations appropriately certified to handle our information.  By accepting the Terms of Service, you signify consent to the use of such Cloud based services.

Details which identify the individual to whom the Terms of Service are sent together (if relevant) with such details of other key individuals within your organisation supplied to us from time to time will be entered on to our database.  We will use these details primarily to provide you with legal services.

They will also be kept on our database for administration and accounting purposes, to enable us to undertake any searches with credit reference agencies and so that we can send you or such other identified individuals’ relevant information about us and our services and about developments and events which we consider may be of interest to you.  By accepting the Terms of Service, you signify consent on behalf of all relevant individuals.

However, except as permitted above or required by law, we will not disclose any information so provided without consent.  All personal information will be processed in accordance with applicable privacy laws. For details about what personal information we collect and why, we refer you to our Privacy Notice on our website at www.tomalegal.co.uk. 

5. Intellectual Property Rights

We retain all copyright and other intellectual property rights in all materials and know-how developed or created by us either before or in the course of carrying out any work for you, although you may freely distribute copies of these materials within your own organisation, for the purposes of the matter for which we are engaged.

6. Correspondence by e-mail and other electronic material

Unless otherwise directed by you, we may correspond by e-mail or other electronic media.  As with any other means of delivery, this carries with it the risk of inadvertent misdirection or non-delivery.  It is the responsibility of the recipient to carry out a virus check on any attachments received.  As internet communications are capable of data corruption, we do not accept any responsibility for changes made to such communications after their despatch.  For this reason it may be inappropriate to rely on advice contained in an e-mail without obtaining written confirmation of it.  All risks connected with sending commercially sensitive information relating to your business are borne by you and are not our responsibility.  If you do not accept this risk, you should notify us in writing that e-mail is not an acceptable means of communication and also make sure that you do not use e-mail to communicate with us.

7. Outsourcing and file review 

Sometimes we ask other companies or people to undertake document production or to provide secretarial services for us to ensure that work is done promptly.  We will always enter into a confidentiality agreement with these outsourced providers and will use only reputable and trusted organisations and individuals.

From time to time, external firms or organisations may conduct audit or quality checks on our practice.  These external firms or organisations are required to maintain strict confidentiality in relation to your files.

8. Storage of papers and deeds

After completing the matter, we are entitled to keep all your papers and documents while money is owing to us.   After that we will return them to you at your request.  We will not destroy documents you ask us to deposit in safe custody.  Otherwise, we reserve the right to destroy papers seven years after delivery by us of a final bill.  This time limit also applies to documents held in electronic format.  We will not, as a rule, retain paper copies of documents which are also held by us in scanned form or otherwise electronically unless you request us to or, in our view, original documentation should be retained despite the availability of electronic copies.

We will keep title documents in an appropriate place.  If you subsequently ask us to procure and forward such deeds or other title documents to yourself or to another firm of solicitors or other person, in circumstances where we are not instructed to act for you, we will be entitled to charge a reasonable fee for the time involved in doing so.  We may also be obliged to retain papers and information obtained to meet our obligations in relation to anti-money laundering as required by law.

9. Equality and Diversity

We are committed to promoting equality and diversity in all our dealings with clients, third parties and employees.  Please contact us if you would like a copy of our equality and diversity policy.

10. Administration

You are kindly asked to let us know as soon as possible:

-          any change of name or address

-          any change in billing details

Notification should be sent to the person responsible for your work.

11. Consumer Protection

In the event you contract our services and the contract is deemed to be an off premises contract as defined by the Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013, you have the right to cancel without providing any reason or incurring any liability during the cancellation period. The cancellation period is seven days starting the day after the date that the contract is entered into. You must inform us of your decision to cancel the contract by way of a statement (e.g. post, fax or email) confirming this decision. However, if you have expressly requested that we start work within the cancellation period (and such a request must be made by post or by email) you will be responsible for paying any fees incurred.

12. Professional and regulatory matters 

Toma Legal is an international law firm network comprising Toma Holdings and Toma Legal Ltd which maintains our offices in London together with associated limited liability partnerships which maintain offices across the European Union territory.

Toma Legal is a limited company registered in England and Wales with registered office at 28 Old Brompton Road, London, SW73SS.  

In accordance with the disclosure requirements of the Provision of Services Regulations 2009, please note that our professional indemnity insurer is Hiscox. The territorial coverage of our policy is the United Kingdom.

13. Jurisdiction

Our engagement will be governed by and construed in accordance with English law.  Any disputes or claims arising shall be subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the Courts of England and Wales to which you irrevocably submit, save that, at our election, we may institute proceedings and pursue a claim for unpaid fees against a client in his local jurisdiction and Court.  We reserve the express right to seek and recover damages and costs as appropriate.