FAMILY lawyers in Merseyside and Cheshire are bracing themselves for a festive season laden with divorces.
Traditionally, January is the month that sees most couples dissolving their marriages. Chester’s SAS Daniels say they have red circled January 12 as “Divorce Day”, when they expect to see a peak in enquiries.
Meanwhile, Liverpool-based Brabners Chaffe Street say they could see an influx before Christmas.
Shelley Hesford, partner at SAS Daniels, said January 12 was the key day because, among other reasons, it will be the first Monday when all pupils will have returned to school.
Her firm is bracing itself for "thousands" of couples in strained relationships to choose that day to start break- up proceedings.
She told LDP Legal: “We get more calls in the first few days of New Year from couples wanting to separate or divorce than any other time of the year – and the reasons behind divorce are often, though not always, based on money problems having pushed a relationship to breaking point.
“We've also had a considerable number of enquiries from people who have been asking about the divorce process, but said they will be thinking things through over the Christmas break.
“From first contact with one of our solicitors to the instigation of proceedings has been, on average, around two or three times as long in 2008 as in any previous year.”
Solicitors at Brabners Chaffe Street say along with Christmas sales coming early, they have seen a pre-Christmas rise in initial enquiries on matrimonial guidance.
Katie McCann said: “We’ve seen the true impact of the economic downturn hit the UK’s workforce over the past two months, with major job losses and redundancies being announced on a daily basis.
“Pressures at work are now spilling into family life.”
The team at Brabners has also seen an increase in interest for US-style collaborative law – essentially four-way meetings between the couple and their lawyers to agree to settle a separation amicably, without the added pressure of settling their differences in a courtroom.
