Trust Accounts
A trust account is an account maintained by professionals for the purpose of holding other peoples money “on account” for another purpose.
Professions which usually employ a trust account are Lawyers, Accountants, Real Estate Agents, etc. At LAC Lawyers, we have a trust account to allow our customers to deposit money with us.
Why have a trust account?
LAC Lawyers operates a trust account because we often have clients depositing money with us for another purpose. A reason a client may deposit funds with us include;
- to hold money immediately prior to settlement of a property
- to hold funds in anticipation of settling a legal claim
- to hold funds to pay other people engaged on the clients behalf such as expert witnesses
- court fees, filing fees, search fees, etc.
- and the main reason for us is in anticipation of future costs and disbursements.
How is money treated once in the trust account?
Don’t worry, trust funds do not form part of the operating cash flow of the business and are specifically quarantined in a separate account to maintain the rigorous accounting standards imposed on law firms by each states Law Society. LAC Lawyers employs industry best practice trust accounting software to track every cent of our client’s money so we can know instantly the state of each individual client's trust account.
Is the trust account checked?
LAC Lawyers employs industry best practice when it comes to maintaining the credibility of our trust account. The day to day operation of our trust accounts are managed by qualified accountants overseen by our legal practitioner directors. On top of that our trust account in NSW is audited by the Law Society of NSW and our Victorian trust account is audited by the Law Institute of Victoria. On top of all this we also have our trust accounts independently audited. You can be sure that your money will be safe with LAC Lawyers.
