John Welch & Stammers has become the first firm practicing debt recovery to be authorised as an alternative business structure (ABS). The firm is one of the first three companies to be authorised as an ABS by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA), which means it can now provide regulated legal activities while its owners are either non-lawyers and managers, or both. Traditionally, law firms have had to be owned and managed only by lawyers, but legislation passed in October 2011 means that non-lawyers can now own law firms and combine their expertise with other professional offerings, such as accountancy, under one firm....Read more here--: SRA issues first ABS authorisations