Would you allow your future to be decided by the roll of a die? Very few people would, because life should not be a matter of luck. It should be something over which you have control.

The end of a relationship is often defined by feelings of helplessness and lack of control. It can often seem that other people are making all the decisions and forcing life to go in an unwanted direction. This can be made significantly worse if the court becomes involved and a judge decides what is to happen.

You can take control of your life by discussing with your former spouse or partner what financial settlement you are each to have or what the arrangements for your children should be, but sometimes these discussions only work if a third party is involved to keep you talking. This is what mediation is all about.

Come to us to mediate if you:

  • Want to decide what should happen to you or your children
  • Wish to keep communicating with your former spouse or partner
  • Want to stay out of court and keep costs down

If you come to mediation you will meet with your spouse or partner and our mediator and discuss the issues that matter to you. Our mediator will help you both to reach an agreement.

Our mediator, who has had an enhanced child protection check, is specially trained to talk to your children. We cannot offer this in all cases but if you think it would be helpful, and we agree, your children can come and see us.

All our mediation rooms are comfortable and appropriate for children, although we cannot see children at our offices other than by prior arrangement with our mediator.

If you and your former partner or spouse do not wish to meet we can arrange for mediation in separate rooms.

Our charges

At our first session with you:

  • We will find out all about you
  • Tell you how mediation works
  • Answer your questions

This session will cost you and your spouse or partner £87.50 plus VAT each.

After that we charge for:

  • The time we spend with you
  • The time we spend preparing for our meetings
  • The time we spend making notes and telephone calls

This is charged at £225 plus VAT per hour.

You and your spouse or partner can choose how much time we spend with you. However, achieving a settlement is like building a house, you will have to buy enough time to get a finished product or be disappointed with the outcome.

Finally:

We will prepare a memorandum setting out what you have agreed and a financial summary if relevant. We will charge you £450 plus VAT for this.

Unless you both tell us differently we will divide our charges between you equally.

Separating couples may experience a range of problems as a result of the change in their household circumstances. Click on our Information Hub link for useful contact details for other advisory and information services.

Contact us, we are here to help.

For more information please read our Mediation FAQs