Gain a little insight into different parts of the group…
OCG Accountants 
It’s been another extremely busy few months for the OCG Accountancy team, who continue their drive to get all end of year accounts completed. Almost 40% of jobs have been completed up to draft stage, with the deadline for getting all the records to us for the late fee protection now passing (17/09/2023) with 39% of client’s records remaining outstanding.
OCG accountants have also been taking a few direct clients over the past few months and this is something they will continue to do moving forward as the department and company continues to grow.
The team has moved to new offices and also acquired additional office spaces for the expected growth over the coming 2 years.
The practice has taken on 6 trainee accountants, and has welcomed a number of new team members to the practice over the last few months.
OCG Mortgages 
OCG Mortgages continues to grow and provide a service to LT4L clients predominantly.
- We have serviced over 90 unique package clients
- We have submitted 153 mortgage applications since 01/09/2022 with a total loan amount of around £39,310,635
Our top 3 lenders:
BM Solutions – 28
Precise – 31
TMW – 42
OCG Legal – Estate Planning 
After a busy few months in the Estate Planning Department, we are delighted to have filled the Legal Administrator role based at the Horsham office. The extra support that Laura has given us so far has enabled us to progress with our work in filling out the Gerry’s Law spreadsheet with lots of information that shows where we are in terms of each clients paperwork and instructions. This spreadsheet will help the BRM’s and other departments to see what is outstanding and any potential sales opportunities.
Both Lorena and Alex have recently passed their Steps course which a big credit to them both. Lorena’s Step course is now on hold for 2 years as she has been accepted for BPP University and will be starting her SQE in September, which will mean lots of studying in the evenings and weekends -Good luck Lorena!
OCG Legal – Conveyancing Update
Emily Coates:
Emily had fantastic results from her recent A Levels. She achieved A*, A and a B. Emily will now be heading to York to study Law. She will continue to work for OCG Legal looking after Form 17 while she is at University. We wish her well in her studies.
Grace Gouldthorp:
Grace passed her final year with a 1st and will be returning to Newcastle University to study for her Masters. She will also be continuing to work for OCG Legal doing form 17 while she’s there.
Abigail Millward:
Abi passed her first exam for Property and Private Client for her CILEX Paralegal qualifications. She has a further exam to do in January for Contracts which she will have no difficulty in passing.
Hayley Blackett:
Hayley successfully passed her final module for Level 4 for her Licenced Conveyancer qualifications and has now applied for her Level 6. Once passed, she will be a qualified Licenced Conveyancer.
Gina Hudson:
Gina joined the team at the end of July, bringing a great knowledge of administration with her. Gina’s looks after the marketing for the practice, following up on leads produced through various conveyancing platforms. She has been doing a fantastic job of converting the leads into new matters for the rest of the team to work on. She will be working very closely with Ben and the rest of the marketing team.
David Morse:
David has been working for OCG Legal in a Locum capacity for nearly two years. He has bought a huge breadth of knowledge to the conveyancing team, and we are delighted that he agreed to become a part-time director in August.
Needless to say, I am a very proud Practice Manager and would like to congratulate the team on their fantastic achievements.
OCG Legal – Private Client Update
We are excited to be collaborating with Laura Hughes, the new Probate Executive to integrate a comprehensive end to end probate process across the Group!
Working alongside Estate Planning we are offering clients an Open House signing days in London and Horsham offices offering witnesses to encourage clients to sign Personal and Business documents.
We are making good progress with the 5 Year Will Review Project for existing Scunthorpe clients. We anticipate completing this project by April 2024 when we will have written to all existing Scunthorpe Will clients, prompting them to review and update their Wills with us and for us to obtain an accurate overview of our current Will bank.
On the team development and recruitment side, Iram Raza, Paralegal has recently completed her LPC exams. We are also recruiting for a senior Solicitor to join the team to be based in the London office.
Phare Financial Services
Details of recent successes to share with the team.
- We have hit £4.5M in Assets Under Management a huge growth of 275% in a year!
- We have another £4m in our pipeline which we hope to take on by the end of the calendar year
Progress on general operations & developments
We have been focusing all our resources into our Consumer Duty documents with our network. On the 31st of July, new rules came into force for financial firms and aims to set a higher standard of consumer protection in financial services. Read More.
