What Percentage Do No Win No Fee Solicitors Take?
By Chris Carter, Managing Solicitor · April 2026 · Last reviewed: September 2026
What Percentage Do No Win No Fee Solicitors Take?
What percentage do no win no fee solicitors take? The legal maximum is 25% of general damages and past financial losses, set by the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (LASPO). What firms actually charge varies, and most do not publish it, so you have to ring to find out.
Carter and Carter Solicitors checked the websites of personal injury firms across England and Wales. Of the 94 firms that qualified, 97% do not publish a specific fee. The Solicitors Regulation Authority exempts personal injury from its pricing transparency rules, so no firm is required to disclose what it charges.
This post explains why the industry stays silent on fees, and what that silence costs you when your claim settles. For broader context on how no win no fee actually works in England and Wales, see our complete no win no fee solicitors UK guide.
That is the question. You have been hurt. You have heard the phrase “no win no fee.” You are not naive. You know there is a cost in there somewhere. You just want to see the number before you commit.
So you start searching. You open one firm’s website. Then another. Then another. You check their fees page, their “no win no fee” page, their FAQs. Nothing. Not a single percentage. Not a single pound figure. Just the same vague language repeated across every site you visit:
You are not imagining it. The answer is not hidden behind a bad search. It is not buried in the small print. It is simply not there.
We know this because we did exactly what you just did. And we did it 120 times.
3 out of 94 firms publish a specific fee
We searched Google for personal injury solicitors and worked through the results in order, examining replacement firms where firms were excluded: 120 firm entries in all. After removing Scottish firms, duplicates, closed firms and firms not offering personal injury, 94 were unique qualifying firms across England and Wales.
You can read the full results and methodology here.
3%
publish a fee
15%
say “up to 25%”
28%
promise to explain
54%
say nothing at all
This post is not about the numbers. It is about what those numbers tell you about the industry you are trusting with your claim.
The Question Nobody Answers
“No win no fee” tells you what happens if you lose.
It does not tell you what happens when you win.
What Does “No Win No Fee” Actually Mean for Your Money?
“No win no fee” sounds like it costs nothing. With most firms, that is not the case. The formal name is a Conditional Fee Agreement (CFA), introduced under Section 58 of the Courts and Legal Services Act 1990. If your claim fails, you pay nothing in legal fees. That part is true.
But if your claim succeeds, most agreements allow your solicitor to deduct a percentage of your compensation as their fee. This is called the success fee. The percentage varies, and under the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (LASPO), it can be anything up to 25% of your general damages (compensation assessed using the Judicial College Guidelines for the Assessment of General Damages) and past financial losses. It cannot be taken from future losses like ongoing care costs or future earnings.
So the question is simple. If the maximum is 25%, what does your solicitor actually charge? 25%? 20%? 15%? 10%? The answer matters.
On a £10,000 claim, the difference between a 10% fee and a 25% fee is £1,500. That is your money.
There are also other costs that can reduce your compensation beyond the solicitor’s fee, including insurance premiums arranged on your behalf. We have written a separate guide explaining how that works.
How Much Do No Win No Fee Solicitors Take?
How much do no win no fee solicitors take? In England and Wales a no win no fee solicitor, or lawyer, can take up to 25% of the compensation for the injury and for losses already suffered, including VAT. That ceiling is set by the Conditional Fee Agreements Order 2013, made under LASPO. Nothing can be taken from compensation for future losses.
People ask this in different ways. How much do no win no fee lawyers take? What percentage do solicitors take for no win no fee? How much of my compensation will be left? It is one question, and the honest answer is a sum in pounds, not a phrase like “up to 25%”.
Here is that sum at Carter and Carter Solicitors. We charge 10% if your claim settles before court proceedings are issued, which about nine in ten of our claims do. Only if proceedings have to be issued does the fee become 25%, which in our experience is what most firms charge from the start. Both figures include VAT.
These examples treat the whole settlement as compensation for the injury and for past losses. Any part of a settlement that is for future losses carries no fee at all, so you would keep more.
The percentage is not the only thing that can come out of compensation. Expenses, an insurance premium and a shortfall in the solicitor’s costs can all come out as well, depending on the firm, and the 25% cap does not cover them. We list every one, and what we do about each, in our guide to no win no fee hidden costs.
Is 25% Normal, or Am I Being Overcharged?
Is 25% normal for a no win no fee solicitor? 25% is the legal maximum in England and Wales, and in the experience of Carter and Carter Solicitors it is also what most firms charge. A firm quoting 25% is not breaking any rule. But 25% is a ceiling, not a fixed price, and a solicitor is free to charge less. A fee of 10% is unusual. So is publishing it: only 3 of the 94 firms checked put any specific figure on their website.
So you are not being overcharged in the legal sense. The better question is whether anyone gave you a choice. If the first firm you rang said 25% and you signed, nobody told you that a lower percentage exists. It does.
People find us by searching for the lowest no win no fee percentage, or for no win no fee solicitors who charge less than 25%. They have already worked out that a percentage comes out, that it varies, and that firms do not say. They are not looking for cheap. They are looking for the firm that will tell them.
A flat 25% means the claim that settles in a few letters pays the same share as the claim that goes to a hearing.
We don’t think that is fair, which is why our fee is 10% unless court proceedings have to be issued. We can afford to because there are only two of us, and a firm with two solicitors and nothing above them costs far less to run. Before you sign with any firm, ask for the figure in pounds: “If I win £10,000, how much do I receive?” A firm that knows its own fee can answer that in one sentence.
The Personal Injury Industry Has a Trust Problem. This Is Part of It.
Be straight with yourself. What comes to mind when you hear “personal injury solicitor”? For most people, it is cold calls. Text messages after an accident. Claims factories.
The industry has spent decades building that reputation. And most people’s first instinct when they need a PI solicitor is not confidence. It is suspicion.
Now think about what happens when that suspicious, cautious person starts looking for help. The one thing that could build trust instantly, a plain answer to the most basic question, is the one thing almost nobody will give them.
Every firm that refuses to publish its fee is asking you to trust them before they have earned it.
If you ask a conveyancing solicitor what they charge, they will tell you on their website. If you ask an employment solicitor, they will tell you. If you ask a probate solicitor, they will tell you. Personal injury is the exception. And the exception is not an accident.
So Why Don’t They Just Put It on the Website?
Every firm has marketing costs. Some spend on television advertising. Some spend on Google Ads. Some build a reputation through the work itself. The costs differ, but every firm knows what it charges.
The question is whether they tell you before you call or after you have already committed. That is not a cost question. That is a values question.
A firm charging 25% could publish 25% and explain why. They choose not to. And whatever the reason, the effect is the same.
If no firm will tell you what it charges, you cannot make an informed choice. You phone one firm, they sound friendly, they say “no win no fee,” and you sign. You never find out whether a different firm would have charged you less, communicated better, or handled your claim at senior level from start to finish.
The Regulation Gap Nobody Talks About
The Solicitors Regulation Authority introduced transparency rules in December 2018 requiring law firms to publish pricing for several types of legal work. Personal injury is not covered. The SRA specifically exempted PI work from these rules. That is not an oversight. It is a policy choice. And until that changes, the only firms that publish PI fees are the ones that choose to.
What It Looks Like When a Firm Actually Tells You
The Price. The People. The Proof.
1. Transparency First
If a firm won’t tell you what it charges before you call, ask yourself why.
Every firm could explain how it approaches fees. A range. A list of factors. A worked example. We found that 97% don’t publish a specific fee. Not because they can’t. Because they choose not to. The fee is the first test of whether a firm puts your interests first. If they fail that test, what else are they not telling you?
2. What We Charge and Why
10%
when settled without
court proceedings
25%
only if court proceedings
become necessary
10% is really unusual, and we know it. We can do it because there are two of us. No departments, no call centre, no television adverts, no paid Google listings, no claims companies to pay for sending us your name. Every one of those has to be paid for somewhere, and at most firms it comes out of the success fee. Low overhead is what makes 10% possible. The difference between our two figures is not arbitrary. 10% reflects a claim where liability is admitted early and the insurer makes a reasonable offer. Less work. Less risk. 25% reflects a claim where we pay court fees upfront, face hearing fees, and carry liability for a barrister’s costs whether we win or not. If the claim fails, we absorb all of it. The fee is based on what the work involves, not on what the law allows.
3. Who Handles Your Claim
Two senior solicitors. No juniors. No handoffs. No call centres.
Chris Carter (qualified 1993, 33 years of personal injury experience) and David Healey (qualified 2005, 21 years of personal injury experience) handle every claim personally from start to finish. You get a named solicitor’s direct number from day one. That is unusual too. It is rare for every claim at a firm to be run from start to finish by a senior solicitor. Here there is nobody else to pass it to.
Four claim types only: accidents at work, allergy and anaphylaxis claims, needlestick and sharps injuries, and accidents in public places. We do four things properly rather than thirty things adequately. That is not a limitation. It is 33 years of specialist knowledge that volume firms handling hundreds of claim types cannot accumulate.
4. Which Claims We Take
We do not take every claim. If yours will not succeed, we will say so.
A low fee does not mean we take whatever comes in. Before we act, we have to be satisfied that a claim has reasonable prospects of success. If we are not, we will tell you, usually on the first call, and tell you why. There is no point giving anyone false hope. It works the other way too: 29 of the claims we have won were turned down by other firms first.
5. The Question for Every Other Firm
If we can publish our fees, why can’t you?
We publish our fee because that is how we do things. Straightforward advice. Total transparency. Not just about costs, but about everything: what your claim involves, what we think it is worth, who handles it, and what could go wrong. We do not believe you should have to ask. If we can put our fee on a website in plain English, every firm in the country can. And 97% have chosen not to.
251 five-star Google reviews. Nationwide service across England and Wales.
“We could do what everyone else does and wait until someone phones to mention the fee. But that is not how we would want to be treated. If you are trusting us with your claim, the least we can do is tell you what it costs before you pick up the phone.”
Chris Carter, Managing Solicitor, Carter & Carter Solicitors
Fees Are the First Question. They Should Not Be the Last.
Fees are the first thing the industry would rather you did not ask about. But they are not the only thing worth questioning.
Who actually handles your claim? The senior solicitor named on the website, or a junior you have never spoken to? When a firm pushes you to accept the first offer, is that because it is the right figure, or because a quick settlement at their fee percentage is more profitable than fighting for what you deserve?
Every one of these questions has the same structure. Whose interests does this serve? This is the first in a series of posts looking at the things the personal injury industry keeps quiet about. Not attacks on other firms. Just upfront answers to questions the public are asking but nobody else will address.
Once you know the number, the next question is which firm. Our guide on how to choose a no win no fee solicitor gives the eight questions to ask before you sign, with what a good answer and a red flag answer sound like.
Questions About Solicitor Fees and Transparency
How much do no win no fee lawyers take in the UK?
Can a no win no fee solicitor charge less than 25%?
What is the percentage actually taken from?
Why isn’t the fee on my solicitor’s website?
Is “no win no fee” really free?
Why do some solicitors charge 10% and others 25%?
Do you take on every claim?
Why does Carter & Carter charge 25% when court proceedings are issued?
Related
The Full Study: Do Personal Injury Solicitors Publish Their Fees?
No Win No Fee Hidden Costs: What Will I Actually Get?
How to Choose a No Win No Fee Solicitor: 8 Questions to Ask Before You Sign
Do I Actually Need ATE Insurance?
Accident at Work Claims · Allergy Claims · Accidents in Public Places
You Have Read the Research. You Know the Questions to Ask.
If you want to talk to a firm that already answered them, call Chris or David directly. No call handlers, no scripts. Just an upfront conversation with a senior solicitor who will tell you what it costs before you commit to anything.
Free call · No obligation · Available Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm
Chris Carter is the Managing Solicitor at Carter & Carter Solicitors in Whaley Bridge, Derbyshire. Qualified in 1993, Chris has spent over 33 years handling personal injury claims across the firm’s four specialist practice areas: accidents at work, allergy and anaphylaxis claims, needlestick and sharps injuries, and accidents in public places. Carter & Carter is one of very few firms in England and Wales to publish its fee structure upfront and to handle every claim personally at senior solicitor level from start to finish.