Wake Smith Solicitors is one of South Yorkshire’s leading firms of solicitors, based in Sheffield for over 200 years. The firm has built an enviable reputation for forging successful professional relationships. Understanding key business and individual legal needs has enabled Wake Smith to maintain and enhance its status as a leading firm of solicitors in Sheffield.
The firm has more than 40 experienced legal professionals; including solicitors, associates, consultants and chartered legal executives providing the legal expertise and practical law advice that our clients need and value.
Our family and divorce solicitors in Sheffield deal with many areas of family law following the breakdown of relationships. We act on behalf of spouses and partners going through a divorce, dissolution or separation who may not be able to resolve issues between themselves regarding their family, children or finances.
We also advise on protecting yourself and your assets at the start of a relationship, including prenuptial agreements and cohabitation agreements.
Please click the buttons to the right for further information on all of our family law services.
We are focused on achieving the best outcome for our clients on a cost proportionate basis.
From finding the perfect house to packing up and planning the move – there’s a long list to organise – including the legalities of buying or selling a property. Please use our online conveyancing calculators to the right to get your free online conveyancing quote.
Wake Smith's residential conveyancing department is accredited to the Law Society's Conveyancing Quality Scheme (CQS).
Last year it helped thousands of house buyers complete their dream move.
Our team of specialist lawyers & conveyancers can help you with:
Moving House
Our friendly team of property law and conveyancing solicitors are experts when it comes to moving, buying or selling your house – and we’ll make the whole process as simple as possible. We have prepared a house buying timeline to help you understand the process, please click the buttons to the right to find out more.
With no hidden charges you can get an honest fixed fee conveyancing quote online, click here.
Buying, selling
Talk to our residential conveyancing experts for a personalised, high quality conveyancing service to help you buy or sell a property efficiently and without any stress.
We can help with all the legal elements of transferring property, but are happy to help you arrange everything else you might need, like changes to Wills and lasting powers of attorney.
Remortgaging
You can re-mortgage your property if you own it outright or if you already have an existing mortgage. This could be because you want to move mortgage provider or increase your borrowing to undertake home improvements.
The re-mortgage process is in fact simpler than a purchase or sale because the deeds of the property are already in your name.
Transferring
A transfer of title is the process where you transfer the ownership of your property to somebody else.
A transfer of title is a straightforward process and we are here to ensure everything moves across smoothly and properly so there are no issues in the future.
Our Employment Solicitors in Sheffield provide practical and effective advice on Employment Law and HR best practice for individuals.
Our employment solicitors deal with all types of ending the employment relationship and also with ensuring that employment relationships continue despite a problem which has arisen, for example bullying or harassment at work.
Early advice is often critical to understanding and planning how to achieve the right result. For personal clients we offer a free case assessment either face to face or by telephone to assist with understanding the issues, possible solutions, information on costs and ways to fund.
Because we act for employers as well as employees, we have both legal and know-how expertise on all manner of problems such as harassment; disciplinary hearings; grievance procedures; redundancy and pay disputes including holiday pay and overtime. We regularly act in discrimination claims including Employment Tribunal work.
We also represent employees at professional standards and other disciplinary hearings.
Our Employment team are recommended in the the UK Legal 500 2020.
We are specialist on serious accident claims including head injuries, spinal injuries or any other life changing injuries including fatal accidents.
Serious injuries can occur anywhere but particularly at work, on the roads and as the result of falls from height.
If you have a valid claim for a serious injury you can expect to recover the costs of rehabilitation and therapy, care and support services, private healthcare, any adaptations to your home; in fact whatever you need to get your life back on track, as well as lost earnings and other expenses.
Our team of experienced personal injury solicitors will advise you quickly on whether you can make a claim. Most personal injury claims will settle without the need to go to court. However, if you need to take your claim to court we are highly experienced at all levels of the court system, through to the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court.
Our private client team are here to help you write a Will, set up a Lasting Power of Attorney, administer an estate, or even create a trust settlement. We provide expert advice and can assist you in making the right decisions to protect your family’s wealth and to support your loved ones in difficult times.
No one likes to think of their own mortality, however prudent estate planning and putting in place the necessary legal documents, such as a Will or LPA, can not only save you and your loved ones thousands of pounds, but more importantly give you peace of mind and avoid a lot of stress and anxiety for your family in the event of your death or incapacity.
We combine technical expertise with a friendly, down to earth, approach and tailor our advice to your particular circumstances. We listen carefully to ensure we understand your wishes and provide you with expert advice so you understand how we can achieve your goals.
Our private client team are recommended by the UK Legal 500 2020.
Wake Smith is the official legacy partner of Museums Sheffield.
Our team of company and commercial solicitors in Sheffield provide clear and understandable legal advice to businesses across a range of sectors, and their owners, throughout the life cycle of the business on all their commercial, company and corporate finance matters.
Our solicitors advise clients from their start up, to trading to growth, onto reorganisation and exit and everything that comes in-between.
Our specialist team of commercial solicitors understand how businesses operate so they can advise on the key legal issue that affects them.
We have a team who are specialists in the manufacturing and healthcare industry sectors.
The team is recommended by the The UK Legal 500 2020.
Copyright seeks to protect the form of expression of ideas and not the ideas themselves as such (ideas may be protected by confidentiality or be a Patent). The primary purpose of copyright law is to reward authors for the creation of original works, that is, works where the author has expended independent effort to create the work.
Design right protects the appearance of a purely functional product. Examples of items protected by design right are functional articles with no aesthetic appeal such as agricultural tools. Different parts of the same article may or may not be protected: in the case of a hot water bottle, for example, design right might extend to particular features of the bottle such as its shape, the shape of the nozzle or a combination of these features, but it would not apply to any printed pattern on the surface of the bottle which was there only as decoration.
The “classic form” of passing off involves a three-part test. This “classical trinity” test was described by Lord Oliver in the Jif Lemon case (Reckitt & Colman Products Ltd v Borden Inc [1990] UKHL 12):
A goodwill or reputation attached to the goods or services. A misrepresentation by the defendant to the public (whether or not intentional) leading or likely to lead the public to believe that the goods or services offered by him are the goods or services of the claimant. Damage to the claimant, by reason of the erroneous belief engendered by the defendant’s misrepresentation that the source of the defendant’s goods or services is the same as the source of those offered by the claimant.
A patent enables its owner to exploit the patented technology exclusively, either on its own account or by licensing the technology to third parties. Patents can be extremely valuable assets, especially in certain sectors, such as pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, industrial chemicals and electronics, and particularly if the patentee is prepared to invest the time and money necessary to protect them.
A valuable commercial asset.
Commercially exploitable.
Relatively easy to protect and enforce.
A deterrent to infringers.
Renewable indefinitely.
