These are professionals who advise businesses, NGOs and government organisations on business-related deals. Commercial solicitors cover a wide range of work. Law firms to whom these lawyers work for are divided into practice areas for lawyers to practice in a specific area of specialisation. Commercial law entails two distinct parts; transactional and contentious. Transactional lawyers draw up legal documents their client is working on and review them for correctness, while contentious lawyers help clients resolve disputes with third parties. Some areas of practice have both contentious and transactional lawyers.
Practice areas of a commercial law firm
Corporate law:
Companies are required to comply with their constitution and the laws governing all companies. It is the duties of corporate lawyers to ensure all its client’s activities comply with departmental regulations. Corporate lawyers prepare legal documents in all the corporate transactions and activities restructuring and acquisitions to ensure every legal aspect runs in respect with the law and the schedule. In some cases, they act as project managers to ensure all legal requirements run smoothly.
Finance and banking:
Finance and banking lawyers ensure their clients are legally protected and help avert risks involved in financial deals like when lenders give finances to the borrowers, they assess the risks involved. When borrowers fail to meet their obligation to return the money, commercial lawyers take up to them using the legal mechanism to restore the funds from the borrowers. Their tasks include drafting and reviewing of legally binding documents between the lender and the borrower to ensure the funding process is successful and mainly to make sure the borrower meets all the legal requirements to receive the funds. Finance lawyers also advise their clients on financial, legal matters existing and put across amendments as required or appropriate.
Dispute resolution:
Lawyers operating under this area of legal practice provide legal advice to their clients relating issues they are involved in and draw a strategy that offers to resolve the matter amicably without causing harm to others. If the disputes proceed to courtrooms, their duties will be to draft documents that will guide their client through court trials or hearings. Senior dispute legal experts provide arbitration and mediation to settle out of courts. Suppose the worst happens and the client is found guilty. In that case, dispute resolution lawyers will advise transactional lawyers on how to minimise the adverse outcomes and how to deal with future disputes.
Other practice areas for lawyers
Majority of the lawyers work in large legal firms such as Taurus Legal as corporate, dispute and resolution and finance and banking. Still, other small departments exist, for example, employment lawyers, EU, IP, tax and real estate lawyers. Their primary duties are advising clients when making transactions or when disputes come up. Other responsibilities include training lawyers from different departments and enlightening them with the changes arising. Lawyers in these smaller departments offer their own clients’ dispute resolution, and their work may resemble fellow lawyers at the corporate, litigation or finance dispute resolution. Lawyers in the real estate, for example, working on a sale of a commercial property will perform duties similar to corporate lawyers when working on the sale of the property. Another example is the employment lawyers acting on behalf of their clients, will go through tribunal just like colleagues in litigation to fight for their clients’ rights for compensation or whatever the dispute involved.
