Proposed changes to the way sole practitioner firms are authorised could see many forced to stop practising due to the ‘unique problem’ they will face meeting new compliance requirements, the Sole Practitioners Group (SPG) has warned.

Changes contained in a Solicitors Regulation Authority consultation, Sole Practice: Modernising Authorisation, include proposals to simplify regulation by treating sole practitioner firms the same as partner firms and alternative business structures (ABSs). This would require sole practitioner firms to appoint compliance officers for ‘legal practice’ and ‘finance and administration’.

Responding, the SPG said there was a ‘high probability’ that ‘within sole practitioner firms these positions will be filled by one and the same person… a unique problem to sole practitioner firms’. The SPG said one individual would not have time to perform both roles effectively and, if the SRA removed its ‘approval’ of the compliance officer, the firm would have to cease practising.

The SPG also raised concerns about the additional information sole practitioner firms must give the SRA. It said its member firms were less likely than bigger firms to have ‘systems in place to capture information’, and would therefore need more time to gather data, and longer notice of what information was required.