Senior Legal Disputes Consultant
Daniel McAfee
LLB (Hons) · Solicitor · Ex-Legal Director, COLP & COFA · Liverpool & London
“Most legal problems in growing businesses do not start as legal problems. They start as things you meant to sort later.”
What Daniel does
Disputes handled commercially, not academically.
Daniel works directly with directors, owners and MDs on the disputes, contracts and risk that decide how a year goes. The question is rarely just what the legal merits are — it is the fastest, cleanest, most commercially sensible route to resolution.
- 01Commercial disputes
- Shareholder fallouts, contract disputes and breakdowns between business partners — stripped back to the position, the leverage and the fastest commercially sensible route out.
- 02Debt recovery
- Unpaid invoices chased with pace and pressure rather than process. Recent work includes recovering £50,000 for an SME within five days of instruction.
- 03Contracts & commercial risk
- Contracts, terms, leases, personal guarantees and the informal arrangements businesses outgrow — reviewed before they become the reason a deal or a hire stalls.
- 04Employment & people issues
- The situations directors have been managing informally: exits, performance, disputes and the conversations that need a qualified view before they escalate.
- 05Legal risk diagnostics
- A structured review of where legal risk actually sits in the business — written risk register, priority actions and a board-ready output rather than a memo nobody reads.
- 06Regulatory & legal operations
- COLP and COFA experience inside a regulated, fast-scaling legal business: policies, supervision, onboarding and compliance monitoring built to survive real scrutiny.
When Daniel gets the call
Usually six months later than it should have been.
- 01A shareholder disagreement has stopped being a disagreement.
- 02A client, supplier or partner is not paying and time is now money.
- 03A contract copied from somewhere online is about to be tested.
- 04An employment situation managed informally needs handling properly.
- 05A deal, lender or investor is about to look closely at the legal position.
Advising the profession
Daniel also advises lawyers and legal businesses on how the profession scales.
Alongside client work, Daniel advises solicitors, consultants and legal businesses on career routes, compliance, governance and platform models — drawn from building a regulated legal business from pre-seed to a $685m valuation.
Daniel has worked in high-street and national practice, in-house at the Home Office, and as a consultant solicitor — before building and running the legal function of a venture-backed law firm. He is candid about what each route actually demands.
For lawyers weighing a move out of traditional practice, the useful conversation is about income model, risk, supervision and what work you will realistically be able to win.
Having scaled a consultant network from zero to over 400 lawyers, Daniel has seen what separates the consultants who build a practice from those who stall: positioning, pricing, referral relationships, pipeline discipline and the operational support behind them.
Daniel helped build the UK’s first AI-native law firm through three funding rounds to a $685m valuation, holding COLP and COFA responsibility throughout.
He advises on what regulated scale really requires — supervision, file quality, onboarding, compliance monitoring and the systems that let technology accelerate a firm without breaking it.
For firms and legal businesses under pressure to grow, Daniel advises on the risk and compliance infrastructure that keeps growth defensible: policies, Accounts Rules, supervision frameworks and connecting SRA obligations to commercial decisions at board level.
Read the full picture on New Legal Careers, or if you are a lawyer thinking about building something of your own, see New Legal Partnership.
Background
Litigation instincts, scaled inside a high-growth legal business.
Daniel works with UK founders, MDs, funded start-ups and scaling businesses as their fractional legal counsel — practical, fixed-fee support across contracts, employment, disputes, debt recovery and commercial risk.
Recent work includes resolving a complex shareholder dispute, post-due-diligence legal risk analysis on a cross-border M&A transaction, share purchase agreement drafting, contracts for professional sportspeople, independent legal advice to directors, and recovering £50,000 in unpaid invoices for an SME within five days.
Founding legal hire at pre-seed, helping build the UK’s first AI-native law firm through seed, Series A and Series B.
Built the legal operations and compliance infrastructure from the ground up, held COLP and COFA responsibility, and helped scale a consultant solicitor network from zero to over 400 lawyers — supporting the business through three funding rounds and a $685m valuation.
The work sat where regulatory risk meets commercial decision-making: systems, contracts, policies, onboarding, supervision and monitoring, connected directly to the board.
Self-employed consultant solicitor inside a large national firm, managing an active caseload across commercial disputes, personal injury, housing and landlord and tenant matters — getting across facts quickly and giving clear advice when clients needed decisions rather than theory.
A specialist legal and intelligence role supporting investigations into human trafficking networks, organised crime and immigration offences — case file preparation, criminal intelligence and collaboration with law enforcement, outside counsel and the CPS. It built the instinct for spotting gaps early, before they become serious.
Head of Housing Disrepair at KLS Law, building the team, training structure and operating rhythm alongside a busy caseload.
Five years at Mark Reynolds Solicitors across personal injury, housing disputes, debt recovery, actions against the police and contentious business matters — evidence, case strategy, negotiation, advocacy and settlement decisions.
Trained at Emerald Law Solicitors across contentious and non-contentious work.
- LLB (Hons) Law, University of Liverpool
- BPP Law School
- Solicitor of England & Wales
- Former COLP & COFA
See the work or meet the wider team.
What does your business need next?
No complicated brief required. Start with the problem.