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It’s always encouraging when we can bring you good news about companies that we’re working with and we’re delighted to share with you news from Newton Aycliffe-based, Commercial Expert.
The firm of commercial finance experts is continuing to grow thanks to the expert legal guidance from some of Endeavour Partnership’s team
Commercial Expert expanded at the end of 2015, taking on additional team members and moving into larger premises on Aycliffe Business Park due to continuing success.
Managing director Mike Coates founded the business in 2008, which now looks after more than £48m-worth of deals a year for clients nationwide.
Speaking about working with Endeavour Partnership, Mike said: “Teaming up with Endeavour’s experts has enabled me to offer an even more professional service to my varied clients. We were in the process of expanding our team and relocating to larger offices and we needed our legal documentation reviewing as we felt that was an area which needed improving as we felt it wasn’t robust enough. If things did go wrong, we were just hitting a wall and getting nowhere. We would try to claim some of our broker fees back and there’d been a couple of occasions when the documentation was torn up and we needed legal representation.
“Hence all our documents have been re-written by Endeavour Partnership, which was the first piece of work they did for us. Since then, Endeavour has reviewed all of the HR side to our business. We now have a new employee’s handbook and had all of our regulated Ts & Cs reviewed and re-written by Endeavour.
“In addition, I’ve recently instructed them to look at a new agent contract for us. Pretty much anything that requires legal documentation, we now hand over to Endeavour.”
Our team works extensively with companies, like Commercial Expert, to align their documentation which can in turn improve the offering to clients. In the last two years, Commercial Expert has utilised the expertise of a number of key Endeavour Partnership staff, including partners Lee Bramley and Paul Bennett from the firm’s commercial disputes team, partner and head of the corporate team Nik Tunley, partner and head of the employment team Stephen Elliott and associate Martin McKinnell from the corporate and commercial department.
Associate, Martin McKinnell, said: “It’s vital that an organisation’s documents are watertight so that both they and their clients have peace of mind that all documentation is legally sound.
“This is of particular importance when dealing with larger clients and more complex projects as they will be rigid about needing to know who you work with on documentation and legal issues.”
Mike added: “Endeavour has also helped us with a very sensitive issue- unpaid bills. We did a large, very specialist development in the Tyne & Wear area, the finance for that completed smoothly and it all went according to plan. But then the developer decided they didn’t want to pay.
“We decided that we needed an aggressive approach, rather than mediation. Endeavour created the right legal documentation for us to submit to the client, which still declined to pay, so we then instructed Endeavour to collect for us and they were very successful.”
“One of the most noticeable things when you work with Endeavour is that they’re human beings, which I think is unusual for the legal profession. I often talk about how some Dickensian professionals just don’t keep up with what’s going on in the world. We feel that we’re leaps and bounds ahead in technology, while Endeavour Partnership as a firm feels young and vibrant, and in-tune with the modern world, so it’s a great firm to work with. The team is certainly more approachable than other lawyers we’ve had experience of working with.”
As one of the North East’s leading commercial law firms, Endeavour Partnership is the go-to legal practice for a range of issues in sectors ranging from construction, healthcare, hospitality and leisure to agriculture, education, retail, IT and start-ups, and has a reputation spanning over 15 years.
Lee Bramley, who is partner and Head of the Commercial Disputes team at Endeavour, acknowledges the Stockton-based law firm has deliberately tried to change the image of lawyers.
Lee said: “One of our clients recently described us as ‘professionally informal’ which I believe is very accurate. We’re not in three-piece suits with pocket watches which is the image some might have of lawyers.
Speaking about the work with Commercial Expert over the last two years, Lee said: “Once we understood what Mike did, we then had the opportunity to introduce Commercial Expert to some of our clients looking for specialist, non-High Street funding, or those who maybe have historical credit issues looking for complicated refinancing options. So it’s very much a two-way working relationship which has benefits to both sides.
“Clients of Commercial Expert recommend their clients to us because they see the paperwork is transparent and fair – what you see is what you get.”
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