Settlement agreement solicitors

Written from primary sources · Editor-reviewed · Law current as of 19 September 2026

By the exitagreement.co.uk editorial team · Published 19 September 2026 · Last reviewed 19 September 2026 · 8 min read

6 primary sources cited on this page. How we check what is on this site

Your employer has handed you an agreement and, almost certainly, has offered to pay for you to take advice on it. This page is about what that advice legally has to be, what it is worth asking for on top, and how to check that the person giving it qualifies.

Key points

The statute does not say “solicitor”. It says relevant independent adviser, and it names three categories.
The adviser must be insured when the advice is given, and must be named in the agreement.
Anyone employed by, or acting for, your employer is excluded outright — no exceptions, no waiver.
The employer usually pays. It is a convention, not a right. What it covers.
Scotland is a separate legal system with the same employment rights. What that changes.

What the law actually requires

There is no such thing as a “settlement agreement solicitor” in legislation. The phrase is a search term, and behind it is a defined statutory role.

Employment Rights Act 1996, section 203(3A) and (3B)

A person is a relevant independent adviser for the purposes of subsection (3)(c)— (a) if he is a qualified lawyer, (b) if he is an officer, official, employee or member of an independent trade union who has been certified in writing by the trade union as competent to give advice and as authorised to do so on behalf of the trade union, (c) if he works at an advice centre (whether as an employee or a volunteer) and has been certified in writing by the centre as competent to give advice and as authorised to do so on behalf of the centre … But a person is not a relevant independent adviser … if he is, is employed by or is acting in the matter for the employer or an associated employer.

Read the section on legislation.gov.uk

Three categories, then, and the third is genuinely useful to people who do not want to pay for anything: an advice centre worker who has been certified in writing by the centre as competent and authorised. The second, a certified trade union officer, is the reason union members frequently pay nothing at all for this.

What none of them can be is connected to the employer. The exclusion at the end of the extract is absolute and it is not something you can agree to waive. That is the bit to keep in mind if your employer offers to arrange the adviser for you: suggesting a firm is normal and unobjectionable, and the firm still has to be independent of them in fact.

What the advice has to cover, and what it does not

Condition (c) of s.203(3) is specific. The advice must be on the terms and effect of the proposed agreement, and in particular on its effect on your ability to pursue your rights before an employment tribunal. That is the statutory minimum and it is what a fixed sign-off fee buys.

It does not include, and is not the same as, an opinion on whether the figure is fair. That requires somebody to form a view on what your claim is worth, which is a different piece of work on a different timescale. Most advisers will give you a steer without being asked. If you want the analysis rather than the steer, say so when you book, because it changes the quote.

What firms charge and who pays for it · What is actually negotiable

Five questions worth asking on the first call

Will you cap your fee at my employer’s contribution? Frequently yes, for a straightforward sign-off. Get it in the client care letter.
Is that inclusive or exclusive of VAT? The difference is about twenty per cent and it is the usual reason a quote and an invoice disagree.
What happens to the fee if I decide not to sign? Many employer contributions are payable only on completion.
Do you act in this jurisdiction? A trivial question in Manchester, a load-bearing one if you worked in Scotland.
How quickly can you do it? Same day and next day are both common for a sign-off, which changes how frightening a short deadline actually is.

What we are, so you can weigh what we say

We are not a law firm and we are not regulated by the SRA. Firms pay us a fixed amount for each enquiry we pass on, agreed before any of it happens, and that amount does not change with the size of your settlement, with whether you instruct anybody, or with what a firm charges. We do not rank firms and we do not claim to know which is right for you. The whole arrangement is set out in the disclaimer linked at the foot of this page.

By city

Each city page carries the tribunal venue that actually hears claims from that city, taken from the HM Courts & Tribunals Service court and tribunal finder, and the median full-time gross weekly pay for jobs located there, from the ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings 2025. The second figure is there for a reason: statutory redundancy pay is calculated on a week’s pay capped at £751 for 2026/27, so how far the typical local job sits above that ceiling decides how badly the statutory formula understates a local worker’s loss.

Median full-time gross weekly pay for jobs located in each city (2025), against the 2026/27 statutory weekly cap of £751
City	Tribunal venue	Median weekly pay	Against the cap	Effect
London	Central London Employment Tribunal	£958.20	+£207.20	Cap applies
Manchester	Manchester Employment Tribunal	£794.80	+£43.80	Cap applies
Birmingham	Midlands (West) Employment Tribunal	£761.20	+£10.20	Cap applies
Leeds	Leeds Employment Tribunal	£741.20	£9.80	Cap does not apply
Glasgow	Glasgow Employment and Immigration Tribunals (Eagle Building)	£796.50	+£45.50	Cap applies
United Kingdom	—	£766.60	+£15.60	Cap applies

Source: ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings 2025 (workplace analysis), via Nomis, full-time workers, median, gross weekly pay. Weekly cap: GOV.UK, 2026/27.

More cities will be added. These five are the first published set and each one was written from that city’s own tribunal listing and earnings data rather than from a template.

Ready to speak to someone?

Send your postcode and we will pass the enquiry to firms advertising for your area. No more than three of them, and nothing is charged to you.

A note on Scotland

Employment rights are reserved to the UK Parliament under Schedule 5 of the Scotland Act 1998, so the Employment Rights Act 1996 applies in Scotland exactly as it does in England and Wales — the statute is printed with an extent of England, Wales and Scotland. The same six conditions, the same independent adviser requirement, the same time limits.

What differs is everything underneath the tribunal: a separate 1994 jurisdiction order, the sheriff court rather than the county court, and a statutory rule that keeps claims up to £100,000 in the sheriff court exclusively. It changes nothing about what you sign and quite a lot about what happens if the other side does not honour it. The detail, with the instruments named.

Common questions

What is a settlement agreement solicitor?

It is shorthand rather than a job title. What the law requires is a 'relevant independent adviser' as defined by s.203(3A) of the Employment Rights Act 1996: a qualified lawyer, a certified and authorised trade union officer, or a certified and authorised advice centre worker. A solicitor is the usual route because most people do not have the other two available, not because the statute prefers them.

Can I use any solicitor, or does it have to be an employment specialist?

Any qualified lawyer can satisfy the statutory condition, provided they are insured for the advice and are not acting for your employer. Whether any qualified lawyer is the right choice is a different question: the statutory advice is about the terms and effect of the agreement, and someone who reads these weekly will spot a mis-stated notice period or a covenant problem that a generalist may not.

How do I know a firm is regulated?

Every solicitors' firm in England and Wales is on the Law Society's Find a Solicitor register and on the SRA's own register; in Scotland the equivalent is the Law Society of Scotland. Both are free to search and take under a minute. We check that firms advertising here are authorised to do the work they are advertising for, and you should feel free to check again — it is a public register precisely so that you can.

Does it matter where the solicitor is based?

Less than people expect for the sign-off itself, which is routinely done by phone and email. It matters for two things: whether they practise in the right jurisdiction — Scotland is a separate legal system with its own courts underneath the tribunal — and whether they know the local tribunal well enough to tell you what the realistic alternative to settling looks like.

What should I have ready before the first call?

The agreement itself if you have it, your contract, your last three payslips, the date you were told to sign by, and any grievance or disciplinary correspondence. If you have run our calculator, the two-part breakdown as well — it turns the first ten minutes of the call from data gathering into advice.

Do you recommend a particular firm?

No. We do not rank, score or rate firms and we do not attempt to identify the 'right' one for you. Enquiries go to firms advertising for the area you give us. Because we are paid a fixed fee per enquiry agreed in advance, rather than a share of anything a firm earns, we have no financial reason to prefer one over another.

Sources cited on this page

Every figure above was read from the source it is attributed to on 19 September 2026. How we check this.