Legal secretaries give administrative support to lawyers and legal executives, and help with the day-to-day tasks involved in running a legal firm.

The main duty of a legal secretary is to type letters and other legal documents such as wills, contracts, leases and court documents. They often work from notes dictated onto audiotape.

Other duties may include:

• answering telephone calls, letters, faxes and e-mails
• organising diaries and making appointments
• preparing court forms and statements
• keeping records of costs and controlling petty cash
• dealing with enquiries from clients
• attending court or police cells with solicitors
• delivering and collecting documents
• filing and other general clerical work.

In local law firms, legal secretaries gain experience in a wide range of legal matters, whilst in larger firms they may specialise in one or two areas of law.

Hours and Environment

As a legal secretary you will usually work 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday. Part-time work, flexi-time or job share may be available.

You will mainly be office-based, but may also travel around the local area to deliver documents or to attend court or police cells.

Skills and Interests

To be a legal secretary, you need:

• excellent secretarial skills
• an interest in law and business
• computer literacy
• accuracy and attention to detail
• discretion, for dealing with confidential information
• a good standard of English, spelling and grammar
• the ability to work to deadlines
• the ability to work well as part of a team and also on your own 
• a polite, helpful manner.

Entry

There are no set qualifications for becoming a legal secretary, but employers may ask for some GCSEs (A-C)/S grades (1-3) or equivalent qualifications, usually including English.

You will usually have an advantage if you have experience of office work and word processing. Temporary office work is a good way of getting relevant experience, and full- and part-time courses in computer skills and general secretarial skills are widely available at local colleges.

You may find it useful to take a recognised legal secretarial course before looking for work. However, this is not always essential if you already have secretarial skills. Check with colleges for exact entry requirements.

You may be able to get into secretarial work through an apprenticeship scheme. Funding for apprenticeships is available for 16-24 year olds and some over-25s. To find out more, visit www.apprenticeships.org.uk. For information about apprenticeships in other parts of the UK, see Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Training

You will usually learn on the job from experienced staff. You could also study for a recognised legal secretarial qualification, such as:

• Institute of Legal Executives Paralegal Programmes (ILEXPP) Level 2 Certificate and Level 3 Diploma for Legal Secretaries
• Institute of Legal Secretaries and PAs Legal Secretaries Diploma.

The Institute of Legal Secretaries and PAs also offers a range of single-subject certificates and diplomas in areas like conveyancing or corporate law, which would be useful if you wanted to specialise in a particular area of law.

See websites in Further Information for more details about the courses and where to study.

You can also study OCR (RSA) Legal Text Processing (Intermediate) and Legal Word Processing (Advanced) qualifications part-time at local colleges.

With further training and qualifications, you could progress to become a paralegal or legal executive. Please see the Paralegal and Legal Executive profiles for more information.

Opportunities

As a legal secretary you could work for a wide range of employers all over the UK, including:

• solicitors’ offices
• barristers’ chambers
• law courts
• local authorities
• the police and armed forces
• finance houses and insurance companies
• estate agents.

Jobs may be advertised in the local press, in Jobcentre Plus, and by specialist legal recruitment agencies and websites.

In large firms you could progress to senior secretary, PA or office manager. You may need to change company to gain promotion if you work for a smaller firm.

With further training you could become a legal executive, paralegal or licensed conveyancer. You could also choose to study further and go on to qualify as a solicitor or barrister.

Annual Income

Figures are intended as a guideline only.

Starting salaries can be from £11,000 to £15,000 a year.
Experienced legal secretaries usually earn £18,000 to £20,000 a year.
Highly-qualified legal secretaries in top law firms could earn up to £30,000 a year.

Further information

Tel: 024 7685 1509 Kempston Manor
Kempston
Bedfordshire
MK42 7AB
Tel: 01234 841000 9 Unity Street
Bristol
BS1 5HH
Tel: 0117 927 7007