The purpose of this role is to provide vital legal secretarial support for the Residential Conveyancing team on a full-time basis to add to the existing support team. Good, reliable secretarial support is a key component in any Law Firm and enables Lawyers to focus on client care and fee earning work. The successful candidate will preferably have experience in a legal secretary role.
You will be working with Partners, Fee Earners and other secretaries in a supportive and friendly busy team environment based in the Barnard Castle office.
This is a Full-Time role for 35 hours per week and is office based.
Main duties and requirements
- Provide enhanced support to their fee earner and be confident and willing to use own initiative.
- Full generic secretarial support to fee earners, as required, including preparing correspondence and documents through fast and accurate typing and word processing.
- Prepare documents from instruction sheets.
- Administer both manual and electronic filing daily.
- Complete conflict checks and open new matters on case management systems as well as preparing the paper file.
- Ensure client details are accurate and kept up to date on both electronic and paper files.
- Closing, storing and retrieving client files.
- Prepare mail and enclosures for dispatch.
- Arrange for all copying to be done.
- Make appointments, arrange meetings and maintain an up-to-date diary for his/her fee earner(s).
- Provide support to other secretaries as required.
- Provide guidance to new and temporary staff when required to do so.
- Attend clients, both in person and on the telephone, and provide such support in a professional and friendly manner in-keeping with the Company’s standards for client care.
- Undertake any specific training when required by the Company and to have overall responsibility towards self-development.
- Ensure Client confidentiality of all the Company’s and the Company’s clients’ information and documentation.
- To contribute as a team member and provide sickness and other absence cover for other members of the team when required.
- To contribute as a team member in the continual review of efficiencies within the department.
Preferred skills and experience
- Experience of working in a legal environment along with relevant departmental experience is desirable.
- Experience in performing completion tasks on residential sale and purchase transactions preferred but not essential as full training will be given.
- Fast and accurate audio and copy typing skills, including digital dictation and integrated legal software systems.
- Experience of Microsoft Office Suite, including Word and Excel.
- Excellent English grammar/spelling; familiarity with legal terminology and numerical skills.
- Excellent communication and interpersonal skills, including experience in dealing with a range of clients via telephone and face-to-face.
- Discretion and confidentiality is essential.
- Ability to organise and prioritise your workload to the required standard and within the required timescales.
- Ability to work effectively within a team as well as independently.
- Ability to work to strict deadlines as and when required; this may involve some flexibility in working hours and occasional overtime where deadlines need to be met.
- Proactive and able to use own initiative within guidelines as set by the Partners and fee earners.
Person specification
- Self-motivation: energy; positivity; can-do attitude.
- Flexibility.
- Confidentiality and discretion.
- Proactive; willing to use initiative.
- Able to work well independently as well as part of a team.
