External legal counsel on a retainer for companies without an in-house legal team

Who we help

• Growing companies that can no longer handle legal matters as they come.
• Companies with a steady flow of contracts, suppliers or business customers.
• Groups of companies that need their company secretarial work coordinated.
• Foreign-owned companies in Spain whose managers want a local lawyer and documents in Spanish and in English.
• Managers and directors who want a trusted legal contact to make decisions with more confidence.

When it makes sense

• The company signs contracts frequently and nobody reviews them from a legal point of view.
• Meetings, minutes and statutory books are prepared late or carelessly.
• There are recurring questions about late-paying customers, suppliers, shareholders or directors.
• A major transaction is coming up, such as a business sale or setting up a holding company, and you want a lawyer who already knows the company.
• You want predictable costs instead of paying for each matter separately.

What the engagement can include

• Ongoing legal advice by phone, email or meeting.
• Reviewing and drafting the company’s standard contracts, with its own templates.
• Company secretarial work: notices, general meetings, minutes, filing of accounts and board resolutions.
• Risk monitoring: claims, shareholder disputes and directors’ obligations.
• Coordination with the company’s other advisers, such as its accountants (gestoría) or tax adviser.
• Priority and prior knowledge when a transaction, such as a capital increase or a corporate restructuring, or a dispute arises that needs a separate engagement.

The exact content of the retainer is agreed in writing with each company.

What the scope depends on

• The usual volume of questions and contracts.
• The number of companies in the group.
• Whether full company secretarial work is included or only advice.
• The availability the company needs and whether regular meetings are required.

Once we have studied your needs and the documents, we propose a retainer with a predictable monthly cost and what it covers.

How we work

1. Initial contact. You tell us how your company works and send us the basic documents: articles of association, usual contracts and books.
2. Review of the documents and proposals. We study the documents and set out what the retainer should cover and which matters would fall outside it.
3. Quote and letter of engagement. We send you the quote for the monthly retainer and the letter of engagement in writing.
4. Implementation and follow-up. We act as your external legal counsel, review regularly whether the retainer still fits your needs, and coordinate with your tax adviser or accountants (gestoría), the notaries and the registries.

Who handles your matter

Your company’s direct contact is Sara González Domínguez, a practising lawyer (abogada) registered with the Málaga Bar Association (no. 8502), whose practice focuses on Spanish company and commercial law, with particular emphasis on corporate architecture, holding companies and M&A transactions, always backed by the rest of the firm’s team.

When a question becomes a matter in its own right, such as a review of commercial contracts, directors’ liability or a compliance programme, we start from what we already know about your company.

Illustrative example: an installation company with forty business customers signed a different contract with each one, drafted by the customers themselves. With a retainer, it gets its own standard contract, the terms proposed by its largest customers are reviewed, and the company knows whom to call when a clause it does not understand appears.

Frequently asked questions