A Guide to Checkmylegalfees.com for Affiliates
What We Do
In short we help people who have been seriously overcharged by their legal advisers. This is not the latest craze like PPI or bank charges. The majority of lawyers charge properly and we turn down a lot of cases.
However, as with any industry there are those who do not charge their clients correctly for the work they undertake. Our director, Mark Carlisle, has been involved in this area of legal costs since the 1980s, and has noticed an increasing trend for solicitors not charging as they should. Changes in legislation, for example "no win, no fee agreements" have masked this problem. Another factor is the increasing pressure placed upon lawyers to reach their billing targets. Often lawyers struggle with reconciling charging their clients correctly and reaching their targets.
We are passionate about ensuring that the fees clients have to pay are accurate, reasonable and fair. Whether it is a business writing a cheque for more than it should, or an accident victim having too much deducted from his or her compensation, we want to achieve justice for our clients.
Unlike our competitors we don't just negotiate until our opponents draw a line in the sand and then take the money and run – we run cases to court in order to achieve a just outcome, even to appeal stage, all at no cost to our client.
As it "says on the tin" we check legal fees, and we do that without any charge whatsoever – guaranteed. If the fees are fair, there is no charge. If they are unfair we do our utmost to achieve justice.
Because we believe so passionately in this most of the cases that we run, we run on a genuine "no win, no fee" basis, meaning that your referrals have nothing to lose and everything to gain.
The Terms of the Affiliate Agreement
Definitions :
CMLF – checkmylegalfees.com and its associated companies, Checkmylegalfees.com Limited and Deep Blue Day Limited
The Affiliate – any corporation or individual who has created and had approved an Affiliate Account via http://www.checkmylegalfees.com/index.php/become-an-affiliate/accounts
Client – a corporation or individual being referred to CMLF by the Affiliate
The commission rate – The percentage rate set in the Affiliate's account details
1.CMLF will pay a referral fee to the Affiliate for referral of a client with a case of potential overcharging by a solicitor or barrister in England and Wales provided:
a. The client has contacted CMLF by completing the enquiry form at http://www.checkmylegalfees.com/index.php/check-my-legal-fees via the affiliate's unique affiliate ID link
b. CMLF elect to accept the referred case, and
c.CMLF are able, pursuant to the terms of the contract entered into with the client, to obtain payment of their fees at the conclusion of the case
2. Where the terms detailed above are met CMLF will pay a referral fee to the affiliate being a percentage, at the commission rate, of the fees charged by CMLF
3.If the Affiliate is registered for VAT CMLF will pay VAT in addition to the referral fee subject to receipt of an appropriate VAT invoice
4. Referral fees will be paid only once CMLF receive full payment of their fees from the client and / or the opponent
5. CMLF are under no obligation to accept any individual case, or to offer the client any particular terms of business.
What This Means
You can set up a fixed Affiliate Link by adding one of our banner adverts to your website, or you can distribute your unique Affiliate ID via email or social media. Either way, any enquiries that then come via your Affiliate link will be permanently assigned to you. They will then be considered by us in detail and, if we believe we can save the client money we will take the case on. If we receive payment under our terms of business, you receive a commission on our fees at the end of the case.
The following figures are guidelines only, but –
A small case would result in a referral fee of around £100 at the default commission rate of 5%
Our largest case to date would have resulted in a referral fee of around £3,000.
There are two important considerations that you must take into account –
1.We do not take on every case. If we do not take the case on you do not get a referral fee
2.Not every case results in us getting paid. We operate on a "no win, no fee" basis in most cases and, although we have a good track record, a win can never be guaranteed.
If a case is not taken on, or a case that did proceed does not result in a fee being charged by us for example because it was lost we will, at your written request, do our utmost to provide an explanation for the particular outcome, subject always to the client's absolute right to maintain confidentiality if they so wish.
Marketing Materials
For Websites
Once you have an Affiliates account log in and go to the "marketing" tab on your affiliates' control panel. There you will find a selection of banner adverts, allowing you to select the one that might be most appropriate for your website. Once you have found the one that is suitable for you click on "copy HTML", which will highlight the relevant code. Copying and pasting that into your website will integrate the banner along with your unique affiliate ID. Any enquiries that result from someone clicking through will then be permanently assigned to you.
For Facebook / Emails / Twitter
You can download any of the images in our marketing material and share them on Facebook. You need to ensure however that you include your unique affiliate ID in the post. You will find this in your affiliates control panel and it will have the following format http://www.checkmylegalfees.com/?atid=10. If you paste your affiliate ID into your post or message it will show as a link and any contact clicking through to make an enquiry on the website will be permanently assigned to you.
You can even send the link via Facebook messenger, by a traditional email or by tweeting it. Again, any enquiry that results from a contact clicking on it will be permanently assigned to your affiliate account.
For "Face to Face" situations
If you have a client sat in front of you, or a friend over for a cup of tea, just log in to your affiliates account and then either ask them to use your computer to submit the online form at http://www.checkmylegalfees.com/index.php/check-my-legal-fees or fill it in for them. The enquiry will be permanently assigned to your affiliates account.
Potential Referrals - Who might benefit from our services?
The vast majority of people do not know that there is anything that they can do about legal fees, and those that do feel like it is such a "David v Goliath" battle that there is not much they can do about it so the market really is "anyone who has recently used a solicitor".
In particular if you have clients, business associates or friends who fall into the following areas, they may well benefit from our services –
- 1.Someone involved in divorce proceedings
- 2.Someone who has had an accident or medical negligence claim and had legal fees deducted from their compensation
- 3.Someone who has been involved in an inheritance dispute
- 4.A person or business being sued or suing someone else
- 5.A person or business involved in an employment dispute
- 6.A business involved in any litigation, purchase or sale of property or assets
You may want to consider Facebook groups, online discussion forums, or just your own group of clients, contacts or friends.
Remember: one of the things that we hear most often is "so pleased to have found you – I simply didn't know there was anything I could do about this"
Your Affiliates Account
Your affiliates account will show you all of the cases that have been referred to us through your affiliates link.
You will be able to identify the name of the person that you have referred under the "item" heading.
Any enquiry that has resulted in us opening a file on our system will show as an "unapproved conversion" while we investigate it.
If we investigate and find that we cannot proceed with it, the enquiry will be deleted and will no longer display on your account. You will receive a separate email confirming that this has happened.
If we investigate and find that there is a good case, the enquiry will be shown as an "approved conversion"
All "approved conversions" will show as having a value of £100 and a commission of £5 until they are concluded. You will however receive emails (on a monthly basis or otherwise at your request) setting out the full value of our work in progress, from which you will be able to calculate the actual referral fee that will be payable in the event of success.
Once the case is concluded you will receive an email setting out the amount payable by way of referral fee. Once the fee has been paid to you, the enquiry will be deleted from your affiliates account.
If at any point you have any questions, or just want to have a chat about how to drive up referrals, feel free to call us on 0114 209 6064.