Having frozen pay last month Trowers & Hamlins confirms salary reviews will now go ahead “this year”
National law firm Bond Dickinson has chosen to “defer” lawyer pay increases, citing Brexit as the reason for doing so.
The firm — which has seven offices across the United Kingdom — revealed that the country’s decision to leave the European Union had impacted on both “client activity and instructions”.
In an email leaked to legal blog RollOnFriday, Bond Dickinson’s managing partner Jonathan Blair revealed the firm has seen a “dip in activity levels in July and August compared to last year”.
Continuing, Blair — who has been in the top spot since 2007 — confirmed that senior management had “very reluctantly concluded” it would need to “defer the current salary review process”. According to the email, the firm will “revisit this again in November”.
Speaking to Legal Cheek this morning, a spokesperson for Bond Dickinson said:
Similar to the approach taken by other firms, we have been reviewing activity levels post Brexit and while it is too early to tell what the longer term impact will be, we have concluded that we should defer our salary review process until later in the year when we have a clearer picture of market trends and client activity.
Things are looking a little more positive over at City outfit Trowers & Hamlins.
Having frozen pay last month — again pointing the finger at Brexit — the firm revealed today that it was now un-freezing pay, sort of. Keeping things vague, a Trowers spokesperson told Legal Cheek that “after a period of consideration post-referendum” it would be conducting pay reviews “this year”.
Also speaking to Legal Cheek this morning was Addleshaw Goddard, a firm which appears to be treading a little more carefully.
Like Trowers, the northern giant froze pay earlier this summer claiming it had seen an “impact on activity levels” post-referendum. Having postponed pay reviews till “early autumn”, a spokesperson for Addleshaws — keen to keep us updated on the situation — told Legal Cheek that the firm now hoped to have “a much clearer picture” by the “end of October”.
Yesterday, Gowling WLG — which froze lawyer pay packets back in August — revealed that pay reviews would recommence this week.