Junior Paralegal Belfast, Northern Ireland
Job description
A leading UK law firm with a network of offices from the South Coast to Scotland, working together as one national team. An innovative practice and the first top 50 law firm to achieve “Platinum Standard” Investors in People, our values and culture are not just words on our website but are the heartbeat of the firm. The lack of barriers between departments, a real lack of hierarchy, zero tolerance for arrogance makes Shoosmiths a fantastic place to work.
Our Dispute Resolution and Litigation team provides a complete range of litigation services utilising cutting edge technology and with specialists dealing with different litigation types, all operating under a centralised case management structure allowing us to deliver consistently excellent service. Our structure ensures we can provide a full range of litigation options, whilst ensuring that we have the expertise and experience to deal with complex and technical issues arising from volume recoveries.
This role will provide you with the opportunity to act on behalf of leading financial services organisations to deliver a quality and comprehensive recoveries service with a client and customer service focus. You will perform a crucial role in making sure that we continue to meet of Service Level Agreements and deliver an excellent client experience.
The main purpose of this role is to be responsible for undertaking litigation action with the jurisdiction of Northern Ireland whilst also acting in accordance with the policies and procedures of our client base. The role will suit an individual who is keen to learn new skills and also for those looking to build on their existing knowledge and understanding of litigation in Northern Ireland.
Full training on how to deal with litigation cases and utilise commercial strategies to reach a conclusion will be provided.
- Manage inbound and outbound calls to ensure the best outcome for our customers.
- File management within the case management system to ensure that our client’s cases are progressed timely.
- Recognise any potential issues in cases and refer these appropriately
- Ensuring that customers information is recorded accurately to our case management system and ensuring clients are kept updated on changes.
- Taking personal responsibility for compliance with all relevant client and internal Service Level Agreements.
- Taking responsibility to ensure that our clients’ accounts are successfully managed through the court process to ensure a positive outcome for our clients.
- Remaining professional and polite at all times.
- Attend and complete any training in a timely manner
- Attend internal and external meetings as required and assist in implementing changes to any team procedures.
- Liaise with other internal teams as appropriate
- Assist the team in achieving financial targets, other KPIs, management information and meeting budgets.
- Support the team with marketing initiatives when required and collating management information
- Excellent customer service expertise
- Strong negotiation, communication and problem solving skills
- Good written, numeracy and oral communication skills
- Accuracy and attention to detail
- IT literate including sound knowledge of Word, Excel and the internet
- Ability to prioritise, be organised and efficient
- Flexibility with the capability to adapt to change, new practices and cope under pressure but with the ability to recognise when to seek assistance
- Able to integrate within a team and able to work on your own initiative
- Be pro-active and self-motivated with a positive approach
- Treat your colleagues, clients and their customers and third parties with respect
- Good timekeeping
Please note:
Due to the nature of the work undertaken, confirmation of employment will be subject to a variety of checks which will be carried out once an offer of employment is accepted. These checks will include employment references covering the last 5 years, proof of ID, proof of address covering the last 5 years, Personnel Vetting credit search (which will only highlight insolvency or County Court Judgments - should any adverse data show on the Personnel Vetting search then any offer of employment made will be withdrawn).Terrorism Check (against data supplied by the Bank of England) and a DBS check previously known as a Criminal Records check.
Our approach to our people is underpinned by our approach to diversity, inclusion and well being. Our ambition is to build a diverse and ambitious workforce that reflects all backgrounds and talents, and a workplace that is supportive and inclusive, recognises and nurtures talent, and has a strong sense of community between colleagues.
This means that everyone who either applies to or works for the firm is treated equally, whatever their gender, age, ethnic origin, nationality, marital status, disability, sexual orientation or religious beliefs.
