Nicola Thompson & Ruth Alison Linda Rush

Findings — machine-extracted (anthropic-batch:claude-opus-4-8); verify against the decision

Two partners at Bottrills Solicitors LLP admitted numerous Solicitors Accounts Rules breaches arising after a chaotic migration between accounting systems, including client account shortages, overdrawn ledgers, duplicate payments, use of an unallocated 'Transfer Differences' suspense ledger, failure to reconcile, and failure to report breaches and a misdirected £327,000 payment to the SRA. No dishonesty or lack of integrity was alleged and no client money was lost. On an agreed outcome dealt with on the papers, the Tribunal fined the solicitor First Respondent £10,000 with practising conditions, imposed a £7,501 fine and a Section 43 order on the unadmitted Second Respondent, and ordered each to pay costs of £14,487.50.

Duties found breached:

• Non-discriminatory acceptance and cab-rank
• No improper use of client money
• Report serious misconduct of others
• Good faith and courtesy to colleagues

Aggravating factors:

• Misconduct continued over a period (25 April 2016 to 5 December 2017)
• Respondents knew or ought to have known the conduct was in material breach of the accounts rules
• Failure to report the £327,000 improper payment during an ongoing SRA investigation

Mitigating factors:

• Self-reported the accounts rules breaches, which instigated the investigation
• No client money was lost or misused
• Not motivated by financial gain
• Accounting failures were made good
• Full engagement and open admissions with the SRA
• First Respondent's personal issues at the relevant time