The services provided by Sirius Legal are always in accordance with the agreed assignments. These may include the following services:
We offer these services in the following areas:
For other fields of law, Sirius Legal works closely together with carefully selected law firms in Belgium and abroad.
At Sirius Legal you are always assisted by a designated contact person. Depending on the content of your case, you will be assisted by a specialised colleague, who will follow up on your case in consultation with your contact person. You can contact both your contact person and the lawyer handling your case for information about your case at any time.
Your responsible partner is in charge of the daily follow-up of your file and is assisted by a carefully selected team of employees, interns and administrative workers, as well as, where necessary, by partners from other departments.
When delegating tasks to employees, interns and administrative workers, we always strive to optimize cost control and to ensure the highest possible level of service by assigning the most appropriate person to each task.
In principle, our communication is always by email, telephone or post. We take the utmost care to ensure the security of our communication networks, however, communication via the Internet is never 100% secure. We cannot guarantee the security of our communication networks or the confidentiality of your data when they are sent over these networks. If you prefer not to be contacted by email, please let us know.
Our fees are initially always based on hourly rates, which are calculated as follows, depending on the nature of the case, its complexity, the effort involved, the degree of urgency and the client:
The exact rate in your case is always communicated prior to the start of our work and can, in many cases, consist of a fixed price calculated on the basis of the rates below. Our fees may be reviewed annually.
Partners: 220-250 €/h; excl. VAT
Senior lawyers: 200-240 €/h; excl. VAT
Junior lawyers: 180-200 €/h; excl. VAT
We do not charge any administrative and/or office costs, nor any costs for opening or closing files, and always work with a free first meeting in our offices (or via video call if you wish).
Costs related to the intervention of third parties, such as bailiffs, auditors, accountants, other lawyers, or costs related to legal proceedings will be communicated to you in complete transparency with the request to pay them directly to the person concerned, so that you can be sure at all times that you are only paying the actual costs. Where possible, we will provide you with an estimation of the amount of these costs in advance. Unfortunately, since these are third-party prices, we are unable to estimate these prices with any certainty and therefore cannot be held liable if the price turns out to be higher afterwards.
Before starting your case, we will provide you with a retainer fee for 30% of the amount you approved on the quotation. In cases where we work on hourly basis, the retainer fee amounts to 30% of the estimated budget. Once the retainer fee has been accomplished, we will provide you with an interim fee statement every month, together with a detail of the services we have provided.
Our honorary wage statements are, unless otherwise agreed between us, payable within 21 days after the invoice date. If payment is not made on time, we will charge late-payment interest at 8% without prior notice of default, as well as liquidated damages of 10% of the outstanding amount.
Your responsible service provider is SIRIUS LEGAL BUSINESS LAW FIRM BV, an association of lawyers, with registered office at 2800 Mechelen, Kardinaal Mercierplein 2, VAT BE 0742.701.086 (info@siriuslegal.be, tel: 02/721.13.00). Our third party account number is BE20 6304 3875 9856. The responsible partner is Mr. Bart Van den Brande (registered at the bar of Limburg and Antwerp). Sirius Legal is an association in accordance with art. 170.2 of the Codex of Deontology for lawyers.
We are regularly asked to provide details of our activities, including for tenders, directories, towards journalists. Furthermore, we try to optimize our marketing and advertising ourselves in the form of brochures, websites, direct mailings, seminars, blog posts, articles, Twitter messages, LinkedIn updates, etc. Unless you explicitly ask us not to do this, we assume that you agree that we may mention your name if necessary and mention you or your company as one of our clients. Before we provide any further information other than reporting the fact that you are a client with us, we will always ask you for your permission in advance. Conversely, when you sign the current quotation, we would like to give you permission to use our name and logo in your communications, to refer to our website or to indicate that you are working with us. We only ask you for the right to ask you to adjust your communications if we request you to do so. After all, lawyers are subject to strict deontology, which also contains restrictions with regard to advertising, which oblige us to exercise restraint and discretion.
Prior to accepting your file, we carry out a check for any conflicts of interest based on files previously handled by us or other companies or involved parties that may already be clients of ours. If we identify such a conflict of interest, we will notify you before we commence our work.
We keep your paper file (if applicable) and digital file for five years after it has been closed, after which it will be destroyed. If there are documents that you have not received at the end of your file, we request that you request a copy from us in a timely manner and at least before the end of the five-year period mentioned.
We depend on the information you give us to process your file. You undertake to provide us with all useful information and documents that we need to process your file on time and for the entire duration of our assignment. You are responsible for the accuracy, completeness and reliability of the information provided.
In addition to the usual tasks performed in the law firm, you agree that we may call on other lawyers for specific assignments. If it is necessary for the execution of the assignment to call on a bailiff or a translator, you leave the choice to us. On the other hand, we always choose other third parties such as notaries, experts or accountants in consultation with you.
We are subject to the law of 11 January 1993 on the prevention of use in the financial system for money laundering and terrorist financing. For this reason, we are obliged to identify our clients and to request and keep a number of documents to prove their identity. For this reason, we cannot start with your file before we have received the VAT number or KBO number for companies and traders or a copy of the identity card for private individuals. If we determine facts that we know or suspect are related to money laundering or terrorism, we are obliged to transfer that information to the President of the Bar. The latter decides whether or not the information received is reported to the Financial Information Processing Unit
We will transfer all amounts we receive for you to you as quickly as possible. If for some reason this is not possible immediately, we will in any case notify you of receipt and the reason why we cannot yet transfer the amount. We also immediately transfer all amounts we receive from you on behalf of third parties to these third parties. We can offset the amounts we receive on our third party account with outstanding invoices, interest, damages and VAT and will of course always inform you of this.
All lawyers are insured for their professional liability with Amlin Europe NV, Koning Albert II laan 9, 1210 BRUSSELS, through Van Breda Risk & Benefits, with policy number LXX034899. The guarantee of this insurance contract applies to the consequences of acts committed throughout the world, for activities that the insured lawyers carry out from their offices located in Belgium. However, are not insured: the claims brought against the insured lawyers in the US or Canada, or under the law or jurisdiction of the US or Canada. You can request the insurance certificate from all our lawyers at any time by email to info@siriuslegal.be. Our liability towards you as a client and towards third parties is in all circumstances limited to the amount that the professional liability insurer will pay out in the event of damage. We are not liable for services provided by third parties whom we rely on in excess of or in excess of the amount that the professional liability insurer will pay out in a claim. We therefore decline any liability for the franchise and any higher damage.
We expressly reserve the right to immediately and completely suspend any intervention in your file(s) if you experience delays in paying our invoices. In that case, we are not liable for any damage you may suffer as a result.
All rights regarding the intellectual achievements that we develop or use in the execution of the assignment entrusted to us, including advice, working methods, contracts, drafts of procedural documents, belong exclusively to Sirius Legal or the third parties it has relied on. Without our express prior written consent, you are prohibited from distributing, disclosing or exploiting the intellectual achievements or recordings thereof in any way.
If you, as a private individual, use our online services or entrust us with your file remotely by email or telephone, you have a right of withdrawal of 14 days from the day after conclusion of the agreement. By accepting our quotation, you expressly agree that we may start the execution of the agreement and therefore do not have to wait for the withdrawal period of 14 days. In that case, you can still revoke the agreement as long as our services have not yet been fully provided. In that case, you must pay a proportionate amount for the services already provided. You can revoke the agreement by sending an email or completed form within 14 days to info@siriuslegal.be. As a company or professional you do not have a right of withdrawal. Once your order has been placed, the associated fee is irrevocably due.
You are always entitled to end our cooperation without any compensation. We, in turn, can also terminate our cooperation with you at any time. If the agreement is terminated, the costs and fees already incurred, and if the fee is estimated at a fixed or proportional basis, the pro rata fee for the services already performed, remain due. At your first request, we will transfer your file to your new lawyer.
If you have a complaint, you can always reach us at info@siriuslegal.be or by telephone on +32 2 721 13 00. In the event of disputes between the two of us, you can contact the competent authority at the Consumer Disputes Legal Ombudsman Service (https://oca.ligeca.be/nl/), in accordance with the provisions of Book XVI WER. Every agreement between us is subject to Belgian law (without this leading to a referral to another legal system via private international law). Only the courts of the Antwerp district, Mechelen department have jurisdiction for any legal disputes.
