'9 out of 10 law firms overcharge'

NINE out of 10 law firms overcharge their clients, it was claimed today, as a survey revealed that one submitted a fee for ordering a takeaway pizza.

The three-year study of 7,000 solicitors' bills uncovered widespread 'creative accounting', including one case in which a solicitor charged for work that he claimed had been carried out by private investigators but which he had done himself. Another charged for the 'cost' of carrying a bag to a meeting.

Ian McLuskie, chief executive of Cost Auditing, which carried out the survey, said: 'We found that solicitors were throwing everything they could at the client.' He claimed average fees were being 'wrongly inflated' by 23.5%, while bills were eventually lowered nine out of time times - once by £274,000 from £970,000.

Last month the Master of the Rolls, Lord Phillips, accused some lawyers of charging 'extravagantly high' fees. Senior partners in top City law firms can expect to earn £1m a year, while some commercial barristers make £1.5m.

The Law Society. said: 'This survey has the appearance of a crude marketing ploy by a company with an obvious interest in portraying law firms as inflating legal bills.'