弗朗西斯-库尔森

Wedlake Bell is a top 100 City law firm with core strengths across Business Services, Disputes, Private Client and  Real Estate. The firm has 73 Partners operating from its central City of London location near St Pauls. Wedlake Bell LLP and Moon Beever LLP merged on 12 July this year.  Moon Beever was well known for its insolvency and restructuring work where the firm has built a market-leading reputation, as well as first-class practices in Private Client, Utilities and Real Estate.   

Wedlake Bell provides a full range of legal services to UK and international corporate clients, public institutions and individuals across all sectors.   As an English commercial law firm our services related to English law but our outlook and client base is international.   Our clients range from FTSE 100 firms, banks and financial institutions, owner-managed private companies to trade associations, governmental bodies,  education establishments and private investors.  

Our approach is to be commercial, flexible and pragmatic: we work with our clients as business partners and not simply as suppliers of legal services, priding ourselves on developing excellent personal as well as professional relationships.

Frances gained her LLB (Hons) at Kings’ College, London University in 1983. She then attended Chester College of Law. She joined Moon Beever in  1984 (where she trained) qualifying in 1986, and became a  partner in 1988, becoming Managing Partner in 2000 and Senior Partner in 2014. She  joined Wedlake Bell from Moon Beever in July 2021 when the firms merged and is a member of the Board.

She undertakes most areas of personal and corporate insolvency, specialising in contentious insolvency especially cases involving fraud, as well as provisional liquidations and injunctive work generally. She is a long serving member of the London Solicitors’ Litigation Association Panel of Supervising Solicitors with extensive experience of executing and supervising search orders and bankruptcy warrants.

She was  Head of Insolvency and Litigation at Moon Beever where she ran a substantial team of insolvency and litigation specialists and  was a member of the disciplinary and admissions committees, then Chairman of the Appeal Committee at ACCA for ten years with good regulatory experience during and since that service. She is a member of Insol Europe (Council Member) and of Insol International, and the IBA. Frances is a regular speaker in the UK and abroad on insolvency, litigation and anti-fraud issues, and practice management. Frances was recently made an Honorary Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Credit Management.

Frances has also managed significant debt contracts for the public and private sectors over the last 3 decades.    Frances was formerly Chairman of the SPG Committee of R3, the Insolvency trade body representing 97% of licensed insolvency practitioners. She was President of R3 2011-2012, and remains a member of R3 Policy Group and on Council. She now chairs the R3 Fraud Group. She is Deputy Chair of the Fraud Advisory Panel, a charity dedicated to anti-fraud work, and a member of the Economic Crime Prevention Group. She is a Special Constable with the National Crime Agency receiving a Director General’s commendation in 2014 for her innovative work with the NCA.