Please accept my apologies for tonight's meeting, as I'm out of town for another few days so can't attend.

Regarding Helen's position I think there are two important aspects:

1. Helen has given us a lot of non-charged support until now, and in my opinion we should favour her for future legal work for that reason.

2. Helen is not a specialist in conveyancing or unit title developments. I understand conveyancing is bread and butter work for many law firms. There are likely firms in Dunedin who emphasize their conveyancing business, but it's unlikely there are Dunedin firms with a great deal of expertise with unit title development. But there may be some and it may be worth doing a search. e.g. I'm aware Farry & Co have branches in Auckland and Dunedin.

It may be that Helen's difficulties with Polson & Co included issues around how she dealt with us (e.g. giving us so much free time).

It may be that Helen has underestimated what work is required because she is unfamiliar with the area. It may be that we get charged more for legal work recently because of this. We got feedback from Kiwibank that things that seemed to be pedantic to us were just seen as part of the normal process to them.

I am of the opinion on balance that we should switch firms and go with Helen because I value loyalty highly. But it makes sense to also have a look around.

Thanks,
Alex

On 13/03/19 1:15 PM, Anne Thomson wrote:

Hi all,

Another agenda item, and some background information (a report to the meeting!)

Sally McMillan, the principal of McMillan & Co, the law firm who have acted for us and in which Helen Davidson used to practise, rang me during the week.

She confirmed that Helen has left the firm, after some difficulties including a conviction. She wanted to assure us that we remain a valued client of McMillan & Co, if we wish to continue using them as our lawyers. Simon Milne, the partner who does a lot of conveyancing, and Katherine Neville-Lamb, a solicitor, have both worked extensively with Helen and are familiar with our files and our project.

So far as Sally knows, Helen is now practising with Anja Klinkert, a sole-person practice in Hope Street. Sally is not aware that there is any administrative or secretarial support there.

Looking to the future, there is a lot of legal work that lies ahead of us at the end of the build, when it comes to unit-titling and the completion of the purchase process. Sally believes that this will require a large amount of administrative support as well as lawyers who know what we have done and what we are wanting to achieve. She believes that McMillan and Co are well-equipped to provide what we need and would be delighted to continue to work with us.

I told Sally that I would convey all this to UCOL when we next met. I also said that I thought that someone from the budget control group will need to to sit down with McMillan & Co to discuss with them the budget we have set for the remaining legal work on the project and whether it is realistic - I don't want to discover as we come to settle that our legal expenses blow the budget (and the purchase price) out of the water. She encouraged such a discussion.

See you tomorrow night,

Anne
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