Hammonds increases fee income to £132m
LAW firm Hammonds has increased fee income to £132m with pre-tax profits coming in at £27.3m and profits per equity partner reaching £367,000.
The group’s results for the year to the end of March, follows a year of investment in its infrastructure, including the introduction of one financial operating system across all of its offices in the UK and internationally, and the refurbishment of the firm’s Birmingham, Manchester, Madrid and Hong Kong offices.
In line with its strategy, Hammonds converted to a Limited Liability Partnership in May 2008, and as part of a drive to better serve its clients and business in the future, the firm has invested heavily in a programme of client service and business development training for its partners and staff.
Peter Crossley, managing partner of Hammonds said: “Despite facing challenging market conditions, we have posted a set of financial results which keep us on track with our strategy. We have seen strong growth in several parts of the business, particularly in our employment, pensions and corporate teams.
“In addition our international offices are doing well – for example, our offices in the Far East have recorded a 32% jump in fee income.”
Significant new clients won by the Leeds office last year include Punch Taverns, Amec, RidgeWind and Barclays Ventures. Additionally the firm was appointed to the legal panels for Royal Mail and British Energy.
The corporate team in Leeds continues to advise on a number of high-profile transactions involving local, national and international companies, racking up deals with a total value of £1.5bn.
As part of the firm’s investment in its core business it has promoted a total of 22 lawyers to partner level over the year and four of them were from the Leeds office of the firm – Jasvir Kaur, Karen French, Prew Lumley and Lindsay Texel.
To support continued growth in key areas, nine partners were recruited from other firms over the same period including Nick Armitage and Shahid Nazir in Leeds.
Mr Crossley added: “Clearly it is important to us that we maintain our year-on-year progress, but we are very much focused on the long-term future of the business.
During the course of the last 12 months we have taken steps to create a solid foundation for growth, including our move to LLP status in May and introducing performance-based pay. We have also centralised our financial systems to make sure the business is closely, and demonstrably, aligned with clients’ requirements. In the last financial year our ranks have grown steadily, with the number of lawyers up by 12.5% and total headcount up by 5%, underlining our commitment to developing the services we provide to clients.”
