# Changing lawyers mid-conveyance in Queensland: what moves, what stays
A buyer or seller can leave a Queensland law practice before settlement. What is owed, what happens to the file and trust money, and why the contract dates stay put.
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Most Queensland conveyances start and finish with the same law practice. Now and then one does not. A buyer loses confidence in the practice. A seller's solicitor falls ill before settlement. A small practice closes. In each case the client is left holding a signed contract with dates that keep running, and the question is how to get the matter from one practice to another without dropping anything.
The answer sits in a handful of rules. In Queensland, conveyancing is legal work done by law practices, so there is no separate conveyancer licence as in some other states. The rules that govern a change are therefore the lawyers' rules: the Legal Profession Act 2007, the Australian Solicitors Conduct Rules as they apply in Queensland, and, for the electronic side of settlement, the Model Participation Rules published by the national regulators' council, ARNECC. This guide walks through what each says about ending a retainer, paying for work done, the file, trust money, the electronic workspace and the contract itself, then what happens when it is the practice that stops rather than the client who leaves.
$1,500legal costs below this need no costs disclosure
12 monthsto apply for a costs assessment
3 yearsgeneral window for a conduct complaint
Legal Services Commission guidance and section 335 of the Legal Profession Act 2007. The $1,500 figure excludes disbursements and GST.
## The client can leave; the practice needs a reason
The two sides of a retainer do not have the same freedom to end it. The Queensland Law Society's guidance statement on termination of a retainer puts the client's position simply: a client may end the retainer at any time. No reason is required. The Legal Services Commission, the state's regulator for complaints about lawyers, says the same thing to the public: a person can change practitioners at any time, whether or not a complaint has been made.
What ends the retainer is a clear statement that the client is leaving. The Law Society's guidance notes that an expression of dissatisfaction is generally not enough, and that a solicitor in doubt should ask the client to confirm the decision in writing. A short, dated email or letter does the job.
The practice's position is narrower. Rule 13 of the Australian Solicitors Conduct Rules requires a solicitor to see a matter through to completion unless one of four things happens: the client agrees otherwise, the client discharges the practice, the practice terminates for just cause and on reasonable notice (rule 13.1.3), or the engagement comes to an end by operation of law.
The Law Society's guidance gives examples of just cause. They include a client who delays or refuses to pay costs in breach of the retainer, a client who fails to give proper instructions, abuse or harassment of staff, an insistence that the solicitor break the law or the professional rules, a conflict of interest that would arise from continuing, and a serious effect on the solicitor's health where no one else in the practice can take over. A more profitable matter elsewhere or a merely difficult client is not just cause.
Reasonable notice depends on the matter. The guidance says the notice should leave the client a reasonable time to engage another practice, and that upcoming dates and prejudice to the client count in the assessment.
## What is owed for the work already done
Leaving does not wipe the slate. The Legal Services Commission warns that changing lawyers can cost more: the new practice has to be paid, and the old one will usually want its account settled before it releases the file.
How much is owed starts with the costs agreement. Section 319 of the Legal Profession Act sets the order: legal costs are recoverable under a costs agreement if there is one; if not, under an applicable scale of costs; and if neither applies, according to the fair and reasonable value of the legal services provided.
Most residential conveyancing is quoted as a fixed fee. The Legal Services Commission's regulatory guide on costs disclosure describes a fixed-fee agreement as one where the price is agreed before the services are supplied, and notes that such agreements carry the same disclosure duties as any other, can still be assessed, and still entitle the client to an itemised bill on request. What a client owes when a fixed-fee matter stops halfway is not set by one statutory formula. It depends on what the agreement says about early termination. Many agreements set out a staged or proportionate charge; where an agreement is silent, the amount is a matter for negotiation and, failing that, assessment. The Law Society's guidance notes that remuneration on termination may be dealt with in the written agreement, which is the first place to look.
One point in that guidance cuts in the client's favour. A practice that walks away without a recognised basis risks having the retainer treated by a court as an "entire contract", meaning payment was due only for the finished job, and it may be unable to recover fees for the part it completed. That is a general principle and its application turns on the facts.
## What the costs disclosure should have told you
The paperwork sent at the start of the matter is the map for a dispute at the end. Under section 308 of the Legal Profession Act, a law practice must disclose, among other things, the basis on which costs will be calculated, an estimate of total legal costs (or a range with the main variables explained), the client's right to negotiate a costs agreement, to receive a bill and to ask for an itemised bill, the billing intervals, any interest on overdue costs, a contact person for costs questions, the avenues open in a dispute and any time limits that apply to them.
The Legal Services Commission's guide sets out the thresholds. No disclosure is required where the total legal costs of the matter, excluding disbursements and GST, are less than $1,500. Above $1,500 but below $3,000, the practice may use an abbreviated form. Where costs will exceed $3,000, the detailed disclosure is required.
Where disclosure was not given, the guide lists the consequences: the practice may be unable to recover its costs until they have been assessed, an assessor may reduce them in proportion to the seriousness of the failure, and the agreement itself may be set aside. Those are possibilities, not automatic results, and they are for an assessor, a court or the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal to decide.
## The file: why it may be held, and who owns it
A solicitor who has not been paid has an old and well-recognised right to hold on to the client's documents until the account is settled. It is called a possessory or retaining lien. The Law Society's commentary on the conduct rules describes it as a right to withhold the property of a client or former client until costs are paid, and notes that it exists whether the client or the practice ended the retainer. Where the practice was the one to terminate, the lien is qualified: the practice must have had just cause. The commentary also records that a court can order documents delivered to a new solicitor, who then holds them subject to the first solicitor's lien, and that courts are less strict about the adequacy of security where the first solicitor ended the retainer without good cause.
Two conduct rules frame what happens next. Rule 14 says that when an engagement ends, the solicitor must give the client, or a person the client authorises, any client documents as soon as reasonably possible when asked to, subject to an effective lien. Rule 15 then overrides rule 14 in one situation. Where a solicitor claims a lien for unpaid costs over documents that are essential to the client's current proceedings, and another solicitor is now acting, the first solicitor must hand the documents to the second if the second undertakes to hold them subject to the lien and keeps reasonable security for the unpaid costs, or if the first solicitor agrees to be paid when the proceedings finish. Failing that, the documents go to the client on receipt of reasonable security.
It is worth being precise about that wording. Rule 15 speaks of documents essential to "current proceedings", which is the language of court cases, and a conveyance is not a court proceeding. The rule's method is nonetheless how a held file usually moves in practice. The Law Society's commentary defines reasonable security as something of monetary value provided in place of payment, and says undertakings and three-way deeds between the client and both practices can qualify. A new practice that wants the file quickly will often offer exactly that, or the client pays the first account under protest and keeps the right to have it assessed.
Worth knowing
Paying the old account does not end the right to question it
Section 335 of the Legal Profession Act allows an application for a costs assessment even where the costs have been wholly or partly paid. Paying to release a file and disputing the amount afterwards are not mutually exclusive.
What the lien can catch depends on whose papers they are. A conveyancing file is not one object with one owner, and the Law Society's commentary on rule 14 sorts its contents into groups.
The papers in a conveyancing fileGeneral categories from the Queensland Law Society commentary on rule 14
Kind of document
Position
Goes with the client
Papers that existed before the retainer, or were sent in by the client
Held by the practice as the client's agent
Yes, subject to any lien
Documents prepared for the client's benefit and paid for by the client
Belong to the client
Yes, subject to any lien
Documents a third party sent for the client, not at the practice's expense
Belong to the client
Yes, subject to any lien
Notes and records the practice made for its own benefit or protection
Belong to the practice
No
In a sale or purchase, the first three rows cover what matters most: the signed contract, the disclosure material, search results that were charged to the client, finance and inspection notices, and correspondence with the other side. Internal file notes and the practice's own accounting records stay behind. Rule 14 allows electronic documents to be provided as copies, and the commentary says that once documents have been delivered there is no duty to supply them a second time.
## Trust money follows the client's direction
If a deposit, a contribution towards transfer duty or money on account of costs is sitting in the first practice's trust account, it is held for the client and does not belong to the practice. The general position under the trust accounting part of the Legal Profession Act is that trust money is paid out only as the person it is held for directs. Moving it to a new practice therefore takes a written direction from the client naming the new practice's trust account.
Two cautions apply. First, the Law Society's commentary notes that a solicitor's lien can extend to money held in trust, so an unpaid account may be raised against a balance held on account of costs. Whether a practice may take its fees from trust money in a given case is governed by the Act's own rules about billing and authority, and a disputed deduction is something to raise in writing straight away. Second, a deposit under a contract of sale is frequently held by the agent or by one solicitor as stakeholder for both parties. Stakeholder money is governed by the contract, not by one client's instruction, and stays where the contract puts it unless both sides agree otherwise.
## The electronic side cannot simply be handed over
Settlement in Queensland is now electronic for most transfers. The Queensland Law Society's summary of the January 2023 contract editions records that the standard residential contracts were rewritten for the electronic conveyancing mandate that began on 20 February 2023. Each party's law practice takes part as a "subscriber" to an electronic lodgement network, and subscribers are bound by the Model Participation Rules.
Those rules attach duties to the subscriber personally, which is why a change of lawyer means doing some things again.
**The client authorisation.** ARNECC's guidance note on client authorisations, updated in August 2024, explains that the form authorises the "representative" named in it. Rule 6.3.1(b) requires a representative to enter into a client authorisation with its client before the subscriber digitally signs anything. The guidance gives a telling example: when two practices merge into a new entity, the old authorisations cannot be relied on and new ones are required. A new practice taking over a file is in the same position. It needs its own authorisation, signed by the client. Either the client or the representative can revoke an existing authorisation by written notice to the other.
**Verification of identity.** ARNECC's guidance note on verification of identity, also updated in August 2024, is plain that the subscriber remains responsible for verifying its client. A subscriber "would not normally be able to rely" on a certification produced by another subscriber's identity agent unless an agency arrangement exists between them. The provision that lets a subscriber reuse a verification carried out within the previous two years concerns its own earlier work, after reviewing the evidence and being satisfied it is the same person. In practical terms, the new practice must take its own reasonable steps. A client should expect to present identity documents again, in person or through the new practice's own identity agent.
**The workspace.** The electronic workspace for the settlement belongs to the transaction, not to a law practice. The new practice takes the departing practice's place in it. How that substitution is done is a matter for the network operator's own procedures, and it is one of the first things a new practice attends to because the financial settlement schedule and the signed documents sit there.
## Telling the other side, the agent and the lender
A contract names each party's solicitor and an address for notices. The Law Society's notes on the standard residential contract explain that, under clause 10.4, notices must be in writing and may be delivered or posted to the other party or its solicitor, or emailed to the address of the party or its solicitor stated in the reference schedule. An emailed notice is treated as given when it is sent, with a rule pushing late-afternoon and overnight emails to a later business day.
That is why a change of lawyer has to be announced, in writing, at once. Until the other side has been told who now acts and where notices go, a notice sent to the first practice's address may still be a good notice. A finance approval, a termination or a request for an extension that lands in an inbox nobody is watching is the real hazard of the changeover. The 2023 editions add a related trap: a message sent through the messaging system of the electronic lodgement network is not a notice under the contract.
The agent, who often holds the deposit, and the buyer's lender or the seller's outgoing mortgagee need the new details in writing too: each deals with a named practice.
## The contract dates do not move
Nothing in the Legal Profession Act or the conduct rules pauses a contract of sale while a client changes lawyers. The other party made no promise about who would act, and a change of representation is not a ground for delay under the standard contracts. The finance date, the building and pest inspection date and the settlement date all stand, and the standard contracts treat those times strictly.
An extension is therefore something to be asked for, not assumed. The other party is free to agree, to agree on conditions, or to refuse. The Law Society's notes on the standard contract record that a solicitor's communication varying the inspection date, finance date or settlement date is treated as given with the client's authority, so an extension agreed in writing between the two practices binds the parties. That works only if a practice is actually on the record for each side at the moment the request is made. The one extension the standard contracts grant automatically is narrow: where settlement cannot go ahead because a required electronic system is unavailable, the Law Society's summary of the 2023 editions says the date moves to the next business day.
> A new lawyer can take over the file in a day. The contract will not wait that day unless the other side agrees in writing.
## When the practice itself stops
Sometimes the client has done nothing and the practice simply cannot go on: a sole practitioner dies or becomes seriously ill, a practising certificate is lost, or the regulator steps in. Chapter 5 of the Legal Profession Act deals with this under the heading of external intervention. The Queensland Law Society explains that the chapter allows it to appoint an external intervener to a law practice, in the circumstances set out in section 497, to protect the public and clients.
The three kinds of external intervenerLegal Profession Act 2007, chapter 5
Appointment
Role, as the Law Society describes it
Section
Supervisor
Supervises trust money received by the practice
502
Manager
Manages the practice
508
Receiver
Takes over the practice
515
For a client with a settlement pending, the manager's powers are the most relevant. Under section 508 a manager may carry on the practice, attend to urgent business, act for existing clients with their approval, deal with trust money under the Act, require files and client information to be handed over, and wind up the practice's affairs. In other words there is a person with legal authority over the file and the trust account, and that person is the one to contact. The Law Society is the body that makes the appointments and can say who has been appointed to a particular practice.
The client's own choices do not change. An existing client may approve the manager continuing the matter, or may instruct another practice and ask for the file and any trust money to be sent across. The electronic steps described above still apply to whichever practice finishes the job, and the contract dates still run, so an early request to the other side for more time is often the first task.
## Complaints and costs disputes
Two different questions can follow a change of lawyers, and they go to different places.
A dispute about the amount of a bill goes to costs assessment. Under section 335 of the Legal Profession Act a client may apply for an assessment of the whole or any part of their legal costs, and the application must be made within 12 months after the bill was given or the request for payment was made, or, if there was neither, after the costs were paid. A late application can be heard only if the assessor or court decides, having regard to the delay and its reasons, that it should be. The Legal Services Commission notes that an assessment binds the lawyer only when it is ordered by a court, and suggests raising the bill with the practice first and taking independent advice before applying.
A concern about conduct goes to the Legal Services Commission. It says it generally accepts complaints about conduct within the past three years and looks at older matters only in certain circumstances. Lodging a complaint is free. The Commission cannot give legal advice and cannot itself order compensation; that power lies with the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal and the Legal Practice Committee where they find unsatisfactory professional conduct or professional misconduct that caused financial loss. The two tracks connect at one point: the Commission explains that a costs assessor or court may refer a matter to it where a bill is reduced by 15% or more, and must do so where costs are found to be grossly excessive.
## Changing lawyers, in order
The sequence below is the general pattern the rules produce. Individual matters differ, especially where money is owed or a date is days away.
From one practice to the next
Engage the new practice firstGive it the contract and the next critical date before anything else is ended.
End the first retainer in writingA clear, dated instruction, with an authority to release the file and trust money to the new practice.
Deal with the accountPay it, or have the new practice offer security so the file is released while the amount is questioned.
Redo the electronic stepsSign a new client authorisation and have identity verified by the new practice, which then joins the workspace.
Notify everyone, then confirm datesThe other side, the agent and the lender get the new details in writing. Any extension is agreed in writing.