Thankfully Christmas comes but once a year

Navigating my way through the traffic-jams that surround the new Westfield Shopping Centre recently, I was astounded by the complete lack of planning that seemed to have allowed the biggest shopping centre in Western Europe to be built in one of the most heavily congested areas of West London. It is impossible to park without queuing for hours and most of the area around Shepherds Bush, Holland Park, Wood Lane, and the surrounding areas are virtually grid-locked at the weekend. Nevertheless when you eventually get in, Westfield is very impressive. Just to get us all in the mood the shops had kitted themselves out in their Christmas best even though it was only the beginning of November. Christmas is of course rather special in the retail sector.

But what of solicitors' firms at Christmas? In my case this year I am having a whopping 11 days off starting at 5pm on Christmas Eve and only returning to the office on 5 January. This horrified some colleagues of mine in West End commercial practices who explained that they were on 24-hour call on their BlackBerrys, were going into the office for at least six days over the Christmas break and Christmas was not really a holiday in terms of the types of practice they were involved with.

But for a high-street practice it is a little different. If we open our doors throughout the 11-day period we will be short-staffed, we are aware of the fact that the courts are shut for a large part of that time and, in any event, it gives the staff a nice break during which they can recharge their batteries.

O Come All Ye Faithful

What of the trimmings that go with the season? Should we all now send an email Christmas card, or, greener still, send no Christmas card at all? When I was a trainee, the senior partner had to rush out, come 20 December to pick up the cards from the printer so that he had a day or two to send them out to the clients, bank managers, accountants and estate agents. These days we order in the cards much earlier but are they a dying habit,

and something which will be regarded as peculiarly historic in years to come? I have to say, given a choice between an angry letter from a client, a bill and a Christmas card, I would rather open a Christmas card any day of the week. Sometimes it is nice to hear from an old client, a member of staff or an acquaintance and sometimes the Christmas card is the only time that people communicate during the course of the year.

The increasing use of the email Christmas card seems to me to defeat the object and to be rather an irrelevance. Sending an e-mail message in one touch of a computer key is certainly a lazy way to communicate. Nevertheless, we are at the instigation of our web-site providers 'Christmasfying' our website with snow and Santas during December.

Another rock 'n' roll Christmas

Then there is the amusing topic of the firm's Christmas 'jolly'. Time was when we used to have a party in the office, but while we invited large numbers of clients and the great and the good it became increasingly obvious that the staff were not terribly pleased to spend an evening in the office chatting to clients, bank managers and estate agents. Accordingly, we started a little tradition of taking the staff abroad, and we had splendid one-day visits to Paris, Bruges, Brussells and Lille on the Eurostar.

A rather bleary-eyed group of solicitors, secretarial staff and others would arrive at Waterloo at some ungodly hour in the morning and set off for the continent.

This habit expanded somewhat to overnight stays in Madrid, Lisbon and Rome, but the dreaded health and safety fears surfaced to make it quite difficult to organise such breaks.

Who would be responsible if somebody was injured abroad? Should the partners be insuring the staff, or should the staff be insuring themselves?

There were problems on at least one occasion when staff missed their train home and had to be put up in five-star hotels pending being jetted back!

Joy to the world

Finally what of that old tradition, the Christmas bonus? When I was a trainee, we all used to receive double wages for one week at Christmas.

On the other hand, I was always hard pressed to get more than two weeks' holiday a year and I suspect my trainee solicitor's salary of £1,500 per year even then was quite low. Although my principal used to remind me that he received no salary as an 'articled clerk' and had to pay for the privilege!

Is a bonus something of a Dickensian relic to reflect the senior partner's conscience at Christmas when he realises how unfairly he has been treating his staff throughout the rest of the year?

Certainly we stopped paying bonuses many years ago when we realised that we were providing good salaries, sufficient holidays, and otherwise for all those employed by us.

A time for giving, a time for receiving

Finally, there are the presents. It is always nice to get a box of chocolates from a grateful client and as far as Cosmo the dog is concerned, even better when the thoughtful among the clients come in with a particularly juicy bone or bag of treats.

Happy Christmas to you.