As you’ll see from the linked pages, if you’d like to progress from here, we’ll have an initial (phone or online) consultation, during which you can tell me exactly what you need and ask me questions.  If you have already done some research it may be easier to have this consultation by email so you can share documents and findings with me to help me to work out what still needs to be done.  I’ll then tell you if there’s anything else I’ll need from you and give you an idea of when the work could be done.  I will follow up with an estimate of cost.

After that, if you want to go ahead I’ll send you a contract including precisely what we’ve agreed.  This will include the research aims and my proposed plan, record sets to be examined, and so on.  It will also include payment terms.  If at this stage we know it will be necessary to purchase some documents (for example Wills) this cost will also be included.

When you have agreed the contract, research will commence.  I’ll keep you informed if anything unexpected occurs and if as a result we need to tweak aspects of it – by mutual agreement of course.  I will not purchase any certificates, wills or other documents without your prior consent.  If purchase is necessary I’ll explain why.

At the end of the research you will receive, by email, a report fully supported by analysis, records and other documentation.  You’ll find more detail about this on each of the pages linked above, but a more tailored set of planned outcomes will be included in our contract.  Where something is not fully proven, I will tell you this.  I will also tell you about ‘negative searches’, where despite investigations, records have not been identified.  I will outline precisely what research has been done, so that this will not need to be repeated in the future.