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Editorial - DLA Piper
  Editorial - DLA Piper



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Ania Lipinski - DLA Piper, Manchester Office. Litigation (Second Seat)

8.30am - Check emails, diary and to-do list to remind myself of what needs to be done today, what issues are outstanding and what tasks need to be given priority. Working on several matters simultaneously, all with their own different deadlines and demands, means it is vital to maintain a diary.

8.45am - Having organised my tasks for the day, it's time for a quick coffee and a catch-up with the other fee-earners in the department. The kitchen is always the hub of activity at this time of the morning!

9am - Dictate a letter to a process server giving instructions to carry out investigations into a defendant in a matter where we represent the claimant. Spend a few minutes beforehand reviewing the file and familiarising myself with the facts of the case and what it is we require the process server to do.

9.20am - Return to a short research task left over from the previous day, where I was asked to look into the process of serving a claim form, that had been issued in the English courts, on a defendant based outside of the jurisdiction. Finalise my research notes, and take these over to the solicitor who requested the information. Talk though my findings, and we discuss the next steps that need to be taken. Need to apply to English courts for permission to serve the claim form.

Next task: prepare the application and associated documents for this.

9.50am - Courts have opened by now. Time to ring court to chase up on a matter: has the court received our request for judgment in default? Turns out there is a backlog of work at the court. Diarise to ring back and chase on this again in 2 days time.

10am - Return to application for permission to serve out of jurisdiction. Need to draft a witness statement supporting our application. Find a precedent from the DLA Piper knowledge database and use this as a starting point. Consult Civil Procedure Rules for the grounds we can base our application on.

10.40am - Pop over to court to file a bundle for a Case Management Conference which will be taking place the following day, and to get some claim forms issued.

11.50pm - Urgent email in from one of the associates. Instructions to counsel need to be sent out by 4pm today, and a set of accompanying enclosures need to be prepared. The list of documents referred to in the instructions is extensive. Make a start on this immediately.

12.15pm - Accompany a solicitor to a Case Management Conference (CMC) held by telecom. Having organised the conference with an external teleconference provider, after a last minute request by the solicitors for the other side, I keep my fingers crossed and hope all parties dial in successfully. They do! Take down a detailed note of the conference.

1.25pm - The CMC has finished.Time to grab some lunch and run a few personal errands.

2.15pm - Return from lunch. Turn my attention back to the documents required for the instructions to counsel. I get the documents copied and sorted into order and pass them over to the associate who would like to see them before they get sent out. Draft a cover letter and they are ready to go.

3.15pm - The letter to the process server that I dictated earlier has been typed up. Make a few amends and then forward this on to my supervisor to read through. No further amends need to be made and the letter is dispatched after a copy has been taken for our file.

3.30pm - The solicitor who attended the CMC and I compare our notes of the hearing. Having checked there are no discrepancies in what we have recorded, I prepare an email to the client updating them of the outcome of the hearing.

4.15pm - We have received instructions on a new matter, a straightforward debt recovery. We are acting for the creditor. Carry out searches on the debtor company on Companies House website, specifically to check status of company. Draft a letter before action to be sent to the company.

4.45pm - Consult my to do list and start work on collating documents for an appeal bundle. Arrange to have documents copied and paginated.

5.40pm - Carry out various administrative tasks; file away documents, write up attendance notes and prepare my to do list for the following day.

6pm - Time to unwind with a few post work drinks in the bar under the office with the other trainees. We seem to find ourselves here quite a lot in the evenings!
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