Much more than shipping 

Holman Fenwick Willan has a long and illustrious history in shipping, beginning in the early 19th century when the Holman family were Devonshire sailing-ship owners. In 1883, Frank Holman set sail for London where he became a solicitor. In 1899, E.A. Fenwick climbed aboard, and six years later W.C. Willan added his name to the crew: the threesome has been a big name in shipping law ever since. Chambers UK ranks it alongside Ince & Co as the world leader in the field. In fact, such is the firm’s reputation that we’ve heard rumours that some companies instruct HFW simply so that “the P&I clubs [Protection and Indemnity shipping insurance societies] will take them seriously.” HFW has been riding the recessionary wave of litigation recently and turnover was up 0.9% to £99.6m in 2009/10. The firm draws on expertise across a global network of 11 offices – including three in Australia – and is building ties with local lawyers in Abu Dhabi and Saudi Arabia. HFW’s strategy is simple, according to HR and training director James Collinge: “It's about continual growth [and] setting up offices where our clients need us.” The firm is at present considering adding further outposts in Europe and Australia, and is set to launch in Geneva in October 2010.

Over the years, HFW has cast its net wider into the trade and energy, finance, corporate and insurance sectors, all of it consistent with the firm’s aim to be “a leading firm in international commerce” and not just in shipping. It now numbers Kuwait Oil Company, SeaDrill and DHL among its clients. At present contentious work makes up 70% of HFW’s offering, but the plan is to “think in a more rounded way about the sectors in which [the firm] is active” – offering corporate services to energy clients, for example. In a deal that is typical of the firm’s shipping/trade/corporate/finance mash-up, HFW recently advised APM Terminals on the sale of its 25% stake in Zeebrugge port to Chinese company Shanghai International Port Group for €27m.

Trainee seats are available in trade and energy; shipping and transport; ship finance; insurance/reinsurance; commercial litigation; corporate, projects and finance; and the smaller area of EU/competition law. None are compulsory, although since HFW’s main line of work is litigation, trainees will spend time in either corporate, projects and finance or the “pure transactional seat” of ship finance to satisfy SRA requirements.

Wet, dry and soggy 

“People are grouped very loosely in teams,” explained one source. Trainees commonly work for several partners at a time, and we’ve heard that some seats are “a bit of a free for all.” The trade and energy, and shipping and transport practice groups both handle shipping litigation. Trade and energy tends to focus on ‘dry’ matters – contract-based law like freight futures, charter party and sale contract disputes. “It’s real law, just like the problems you see at uni.” Contract fans should check out HFW’s work on the ‘Limnos’ litigation. To get started go to our bonus features.

The shipping and transport seat, meanwhile, leans towards ‘wet’ matters – tort-based law covering collisions between ships and salvage issues. “It’s quite exciting,” trainees tell us, as “you have to act very quickly.” The firm responded rapidly to the 2007 grounding of the ‘MSC Napoli’ off the coast of Devon, acting for the ship’s owners and their P&I club. It also advised on a collision in the Aegean Sea between the ‘Marti Princess’ and the ‘Renate Schulte’ (do check out the photos of this). Seafaring is left to the 19 master mariners employed by HFW to investigate maritime collisions: trainees keep their feet on dry land drafting articles of claim and taking witness statements. One confessed: “It would be good to go and see the boats,” before admitting that they “get a bit seasick.” In addition to wet and dry, the firm also has a “soggy section” that handles a variety of issues including piracy.

Best enemies 

One of our sources commented: “In shipping, all people do is sue each other… but the weird thing is that, by and large, they will remain friends.” The same camaraderie can be found among shipping lawyers. We’ve heard of some “really big personalities” at HFW, and some partners who can be “a bit overpowering,” but trainees assured us that “you don’t wait trembling outside the partner’s door.” There appears to be a difference between some of the senior partners and the new blood coming through. “Some partners are the pure intellectual type – if you ask about a case or a point of law they’ll recite it back to you. Then you get the more commercial guys.” The latter fit well into HFW’s ship finance department, which is “as 21st century as Holmans gets,” according to one interviewee. The firm acts for major banks, shipowners and charterers, drafting “loans for fleets of ships and loans to fund purchases or refinancing.”

Typically deals relate to “oil tankers or bulk carriers,” although there’s the odd yacht finance matter for a super-rich client. “You get responsibility early on” when drafting documents, “though obviously they’d be read a thousand times by someone else before they go out.” The firm assisted tanker and container ship owner Aries Maritime Transport, advising on the restructuring of its $240m debt and negotiating the “super-swapsy” of almost 19 million shares in the company in exchange for three Capesize bulkers (a type of cargo ship). Closer to home HFW has acted for Swedish bank Handelsbanken, setting up €170m loan facilities for ferry operator Stena to part finance two new passenger ferries. Newbuilds aren’t the only trade in this seat. “I tended to do recycling deals,” one trainee recalled, where “the heap of rust in the port” is bought for scrap, then “sold on to a breakage yard in Bangladesh or India.”

Time away 

The commercial litigation team is relatively small and deals mainly with banking fraud and trusts disputes, also employment, construction, real estate and insolvency work. Trainees get up to the usual litigation tasks and there’s always a lot of research to be done. “It’s all quite interesting points of law,” trainees explained, and we’ve heard that there are a few old and wise partners who greet legal questions with: “Now, you remember this point from 1880…” HFW lawyers recently assisted a UAE investment bank recovering loans in excess of $600m from two companies.

Many trainees take a seat in corporate, projects and finance (CPF) to tick off the SRA’s transactional requirement, but shipping is never far away as CPF takes on aspects of ship finance, shipbuilding contracts and project work on offshore oil and gas fields. Trainees have a go at the first drafts of loan agreements and guarantees, and attend “big client meetings.” A seat in insurance is similarly varied as “a bunch of key clients throw anything its way.” Trainees muck in with bundling, “if it has to be done,” draft correspondence to clients and barristers and prepare initial notes on new files for partners. HFW also maintains a seat in EU/competition law, although it has only a small team.

Client secondments are available and trainees say HFW “is very good at sending people abroad.” Paris, Piraeus, Hong Kong, Singapore and Dubai all host trainees from time to time. There’s “always a lot of interest in Dubai,” but “the ones that people really want to go to” – Hong Kong and Singapore – aren’t always available at each seat rotation. Languages generally aren’t a prerequisite, although “for Paris they tend to want French.”

Mischief managed 

While they stopped short of using the phrase ‘old-school’, trainees admitted there is a “sense of tradition with maritime law and you can pick up on the fact that some partners don’t like the pace of change.” The pace of change was perhaps not fast enough for three junior shipping partners, who left the firm in September 2010 to set up their own boutique. Trainees say that compared to a few years ago HFW “is almost completely different in terms of corporate profile and the way it conducts itself.” There’s a new website, more women coming through into associate roles, and although the partnership is still largely white, male and public school, at trainee and NQ level the people are definitely more international and diverse. To facilitate integration there’s a buffet lunch, every other month, to which everyone from back-office staff to partners are invited on a rolling basis.

Integration is one thing, but the “sensible” folk at HFW don’t do “stupid team-building.” Nevertheless, its lawyers are not averse to novelty-ing it up for big events such as the Christmas party, where the firm set up a hog roast and “closed off the bottom of the office to fill it with booze.” “I think there was a theme,” one source recollected hazily. “There were a lot of pirate hats.” The last summer party – “HFW Fest” – was described as “a cross between village fair and school fete, themed on Harry Potter,” trainees told us. “On paper it looked awful, but those who went enjoyed it.” We’ve heard stories of welly wanging, jousting, free food and drink and a departmental tug-of-war. Regular sport involves golf and netball, and “a lot of client events” with the big P&I clubs, including cricket, tennis and rugby tournaments. Rugby, in particular is a “big thing” at HFW. It sponsors an international Rugby Sevens team called the HFW Wailers, about which there is information on the firm’s website. Aptly enough, water-based events are popular among staff, from “dragon boat racing to rowing.” The trade and energy group hosts an open bar every Friday in different drinking holes across the City, while other departments descend to a bar below the office called Habit, or hang out in the firm’s café and garden.

The firm receives applications from ex-mariners and those with connections to the shipping industry. Don’t despair if you thought that port was only to be found on the starboard of your parents’ drinks cabinet, HFW will consider people whose closest experience to life on the open seas is the 8am ferry to Calais. Nonetheless, all the trainees we spoke to had a thirst for international work and a desire to avoid “standard City firms doing straight-up corporate law.” For them, the “slightly academic atmosphere” at HFW offers the internationality they craved and they loved the fact that you can see the “effect of your work on the ground.” The firm is “quite keen on languages,” confided one interviewee: “French, Spanish, Chinese, Greek…” if you can converse with foreign shipowners then you’re an asset to the firm.

And finally... 

Trainees say the best thing at HFW is the work and the clients. “It’s just so international, and different time zones make everything more interesting!” In 2010, 13 of the 15 qualifiers accepted jobs with the firm.

Note: Holman Fenwick Willan did not feature in the latest edition of the Student Guide. The preceding article was researched and written in August 2010.