Chambers Management enquiry service

A non-exhaustive list of the types of people who can use the Enquiry Service includes:

• Heads and deputy heads of chambers, treasurers, and members of chambers management committees.
• Heads and deputy heads of other committees and steering groups in chambers.
• Chief executives, chief operating officers, and chambers directors.
• Senior clerks and senior practice managers.

Unfortunately, we are not able to provide guidance or assistance in relation to personal issues that individuals have relating to how the chambers to which they belong is being managed by others. For practising barristers and pupils with individual enquiries, please see our Helplines page or our Personal support page.

Your enquiry will be assessed by a member of our Services Team within five working days of receipt. Once we have reviewed your enquiry, we will either:

• Respond to it directly and signpost you to relevant resources on the Bar Council website, and/or
• Inform you that your issue is better addressed by a colleague or one of the Bar Council’s other helplines and seek your permission to forward it on.

Where your enquiry is beyond the training and experience of the Bar Council’s employees, we will escalate it to the Chambers Management Panel. The Panel will deal with your enquiry in one of two ways:

• If you are content to receive a written response, including in situations where you would like to remain anonymous to anyone outside of the Bar Council’s employment, we will circulate a summary of the issue to all members of the Panel and ask for their guidance. Before doing so, we will first provide details of the Panel members’ names and organisations to you and ask if you would prefer for anyone on the list to be excluded from circulation due to commercial sensitivities or conflicts of interest. You will not be expected to provide any reasoning and any exclusions that you request will not be questioned.
• If you would prefer to discuss your query with a member of the Chambers Management Panel, we will provide you with details of its members’ names, organisations, and specialist areas of knowledge, and ask which member(s) you would like to speak to. We will then provide the relevant member(s) with your name and email address, so that they can arrange to speak to you directly.

Any enquiries received through the Enquiry Service will initially be treated as confidential to our Services Team, except in circumstances where they know or suspect, or have reasonable grounds for knowing or suspecting, that there are reasonable grounds to provide the information that they receive to another body. For example, under the Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing and Transfer of Funds (Information on the Payer) Regulations 2017 and as the Supervisory Authority for the Bar of England and Wales, the General Council of the Bar (under which the Bar Council sits) is obliged to report a person who it knows or suspects, or has reasonable grounds of knowing or suspecting, has or is engaging in money laundering or terrorist financing to the National Crime Agency. In these circumstances it may not be possible to maintain the confidentiality of the enquiry.

If our Services Team need to redirect or escalate the enquiry, it will remain confidential to the Bar Council employees or Panel members with whom it is shared, except in the circumstances described above. Members of the Bar who become aware of serious misconduct because of their work on the Chambers Management Enquiry Service are specifically exempt from the obligation to report it to the Bar Standards Board. 

How long we keep your data for

We retain written enquiries and responses for no more than 18 months. View our privacy statement.

Any complaints relating to the Enquiry Service will be handled in accordance with the Bar Council Complaints Policy.

The Chambers Management Enquiry Service (‘Enquiry Service’) is provided by the Bar Council for the benefit and assistance of practising barristers and chambers professionals who are already, or will soon be, in senior leadership positions in chambers.

The Bar Standards Board, Legal Ombudsman, or any other relevant regulating bodies or tribunals are not bound by any informal guidance provided in response to enquiries made through the Enquiry Service.

All responses in relation to enquiries made through the Enquiry Service are given in good faith and based on the information supplied by the enquirer. Neither the Bar Council nor any individual responsible for, or involved in responding to, your enquiry shall be deemed liable for anything done in reliance on the response received from them. Furthermore, their response does not consist of legal advice and cannot therefore be construed or relied on as such.

Whilst the respondents to the enquiries made through the Enquiry Service aim to support and guide you, you must reach your own conclusions on your professional and legal obligations in each case. Professional obligations include those required of barristers and set out under the Bar Standards Board Handbook. 

The Bar Council will store your query and this response for no more than 18 months. It will not be disclosed to any person who is not connected with the Enquiry Service provided by the Chambers Management Panel, other than with your consent or as may be provided for by law. View our privacy statement.