The SRA Transparency Rules require law firms regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority to publish price, service and complaints information on their websites, so that people can compare firms before instructing one. They have applied since 6 December 2018.
How the SRA Transparency Rules work
The price and service requirements apply when a firm publicises that it offers certain services. At the time of writing (October 2026), the SRA’s list for individual clients covers:
- residential conveyancing: buying or selling a freehold or leasehold home, and mortgages and remortgages;
- uncontested probate where all the assets are in the UK;
- motoring offences dealt with in the magistrates’ court;
- immigration applications, excluding asylum;
- employment tribunal claims for unfair or wrongful dismissal.
For business clients it covers debt recovery up to £100,000, defending employment tribunal claims for unfair or wrongful dismissal, and licensing applications for business premises. The SRA has said it may widen the scope, so check its current list before building or rewriting service pages.
For each covered service, the website must show:
- the total cost or, where that is not possible, an average or a range;
- the basis of charging, such as a fixed fee or hourly rates;
- likely disbursements and their cost, and whether VAT is included;
- what the price includes, and anything not included that a client might reasonably expect;
- the key stages of the matter and typical timescales;
- the experience and qualifications of the people who will do the work and of their supervisors.
Separately, every SRA-regulated firm must publish its complaints procedure, including how and when clients can go to the Legal Ombudsman, and display the SRA digital badge. All of this must be clear, accessible and easy to find on the website.
Why it matters
Conveyancing, probate and immigration are services where people routinely compare firms on price. A firm that hides fees behind “contact us for a quote” breaches the rules for covered services and tends to lose the comparison anyway. Clear pricing is also a strong trust signal for someone who has never instructed a solicitor and fears open-ended bills.
It matters most on paid search. A firm running Google Ads for conveyancing or probate often sends traffic to a dedicated landing page built outside the main site template. If that page promotes a covered service, the price and service information should be on it or one obvious click away, with the badge and the complaints procedure. A landing page without them is exactly the kind of gap a compliance check of the firm’s websites would find.
Common mistakes
- Publishing a headline fee with no explanation of disbursements, VAT or exclusions.
- Showing only an hourly rate where a total or range is possible.
- Burying the information in a PDF or several clicks away from the service page.
- Describing staff experience in vague terms rather than saying who does the work and what qualifications they hold.
- Leaving prices unchanged for years while actual fees rise.
- Launching campaign landing pages without the price information, complaints link or badge.
How to act on it
List the services your website promotes and match them against the SRA’s current list. For each covered service, add a price and service section to the service page itself, built around a worked example: the legal fee for a freehold purchase up to a stated property value, then searches, the Land Registry fee and the handling of Stamp Duty Land Tax, each explained in plain English. Link the complaints procedure from the footer of every page.
Apply the same checklist to every landing page built for ads before it goes live, and date the price information so you can see when it was last reviewed.