How to Get SRA Authorisation for a New Law Firm: The Complete Guide

Setting up on your own is the best decision plenty of solicitors ever make. It's also one with a gatekeeper: before your firm can practise, it needs authorisation from the Solicitors Regulation Authority. This guide walks through the whole thing, in the order it actually needs to happen: which route applies to you, what the SRA looks for, what documents you need, what it costs, how long it takes, and the mistakes that turn a six-week application into a four-month one.

The routes to authorisation

Which application you're making depends on how the firm will be structured:

Recognised body. A firm run as a company or LLP where all the owners are solicitors or other authorised professionals. This is the standard route for most new firms, and the one the bulk of this guide assumes.

Recognised sole practitioner. You, on your own account, personally authorised. There's no separate COLP or COFA nomination because you carry those duties yourself, but the SRA will still expect to see the underlying systems.

Licensed body (ABS). If you want non-lawyer owners or outside investors, you need a licence under the Legal Services Act. It's a heavier process with an extra layer of approval, so budget more time and expect more questions.

Freelance solicitor. A separate register again: solicitors who work in their own name without an authorised firm behind them. Lighter on structure, but the insurance and client care obligations still apply.

Get this decision right first, because the rest of the application flows from it.

What the SRA is actually assessing

Strip away the form-filling and the SRA is asking four questions about your firm:

Are the right people involved? Everyone with a management role or ownership interest has to pass fit and proper checks. The SRA looks at regulatory history, financial conduct, and the soundness of the overall structure. Incomplete information about owners is the single most common cause of delay, so gather declarations and supporting details early.

Is the business viable? You'll need a business plan and financial information. The SRA wants to see that the firm can meet its obligations, including insurance and its people, rather than launching into insolvency. You don't need to prove a blockbuster; you need to show you've thought about where clients come from and how the first year gets funded.

Are clients protected? Professional indemnity insurance meeting the SRA's minimum terms, a complaints handling procedure, and proper client care arrangements. Your policy has to be in place before you start practising, and you confirm your insurance arrangements as part of the application itself.

Does the firm have proportionate systems? A compliance plan, risk register, and anti-money laundering arrangements where your work is in scope of the Money Laundering Regulations. Conveyancing and private client work are almost always in scope. The expectations scale with the firm: a two-partner firm isn't held to the same documentation as a fifty-person practice, but every firm needs the basics to exist in writing.

The full preparation checklist

In the order it makes sense to do it:

1. Choose your structure and register it. A company at Companies House for a recognised body.
2. Choose and clear your firm name. It must not be misleading, and you'll want it free at Companies House, on the SRA register, and as a domain.
3. Decide your banking and client money position. If you'll hold client money you need a client account and SRA Accounts Rules 2019 controls, including reconciliations at least every five weeks. Plenty of new firms start on a no-client-money model; it's a legitimate choice, decide it deliberately.
4. Prepare suitability information for all managers and owners.
5. Nominate your COLP and COFA (authorised bodies). They must be people the SRA can approve.
6. Write your business plan and financial forecasts.
7. Get professional indemnity insurance quotes. Practice areas drive both price and appetite. Conveyancing, in particular, is treated as higher risk by insurers. Build the premium into your forecasts before you commit to a launch date.
8. Draft your AML/CTF arrangements if you'll do in-scope work: a firm-wide risk assessment, policies, controls, and training plans.
9. Write your complaints handling procedure.
10. Start your compliance plan and risk register.
11. Prepare your client care letter and check whether your practice areas trigger the SRA transparency rules, which need price information on your website.
12. Apply through mySRA, pay the fee, and answer follow-up questions promptly and completely.

If you want this as an interactive checklist that adapts to your situation, we built a free tool that does exactly that. The SRA Authorisation Checklist and Readiness Tool generates your personalised checklist in a few minutes and comes with a starter pack of six downloadable templates: an AML/CTF policy, a complaints handling procedure, a compliance plan and risk register, a client care letter, a fit and proper information pack for each manager and owner, and a business plan and financial forecasts written to double as your PII underwriting narrative.

How long it takes

Plan on 8 to 12 weeks from a complete application for a recognised body, on top of your preparation time. ABS applications run longer because the Legal Services Board is involved. The published timescales shift, so check the SRA's current guidance, but treat any launch date inside two months of starting the process as optimistic.

The clock only starts when the application is complete. The SRA will come back with questions on anything unclear; each round trip costs you days or weeks. Answering everything properly first time is the cheapest acceleration available.

What it costs

Two costs to plan for. The SRA's application fee, which changes every year, so take it from their current fee schedule rather than from a blog post (including this one). Our free readiness tool keeps the current figures so you don't have to hunt for them. And professional indemnity insurance, which is usually the bigger number and varies enormously with your practice areas. Get indicative quotes before you set your pricing and launch date, not after.

The five mistakes that delay applications

1. Incomplete ownership information. Every person with an interest needs declaring, with history. Missing one stalls the whole application.
2. Insurance sorted too late. Quotes take time in higher-risk practice areas, and you can't complete the application without your insurance arrangements.
3. Generic policies pasted in unchanged. An AML policy that doesn't mention what the firm actually does is worse than no policy; it signals the compliance is decorative. Tailor everything.
4. A business plan that reads like a wish list. Financial information should be specific: pricing, volumes, funding for year one.
5. Slow responses to follow-ups. Once the SRA asks a question, the meter runs until you answer. Same-day responses keep you on schedule.

After authorisation

Approval isn't the finish line; it's the starting gun. Banking, branding, a website, software, and your first client matter all need to be ready, because the clock on your fixed costs started when you incorporated. We wrote a separate guide to your first 90 days as a new firm that covers exactly this window.

And if you're choosing practice management software for the new firm: OrdoLux is built matter-centric from the ground up, with conveyancing, probate and private client workflows live today and new firms getting set up in a day. New sole practitioners get their first six months free. Book a demo and see whether it fits before you commit to anything.

Or start with the free SRA authorisation readiness tool and get your personalised checklist in two minutes.