Ololade Saromi

Ololade enjoys a growing banking and finance practice and accepts all appropriate instructions in this area. He has recently been instructed to advise, draft or provide advocacy in relation to:

• Payment services disputes (including claims with an element of fraud).
• Enforcement of securities, guarantees and indemnities.
• Consumer credit and return of goods claims.
• Asset finance / finance leasing.
• Invoice finance and factoring.
• Wrongful interference with goods / conversion.

Recent cases:

• Successfully represented a major high street bank in a claim by a retail customer. The claim was for the repayment of sums the customer had invested into a binary options trading account, opened with a third party, which incurred substantial losses. The claim was brought on grounds that the bank had failed to action a chargeback pursuant to the Visa Core Rules and Visa Product and Service Rules, and that the bank had treated the customer unfairly contrary to the FCA’s Principles for Businesses and Banking: Conduct of Business Sourcebook.
• Successfully resisted an application to set aside a possession order obtained by a finance company on grounds that the applicant had an overriding interest that took priority to the lender’s charge.
• Successfully defended a finance company in various claims brought against it by a number of its consumer credit customers. The customers argued that their loan agreements had given rise to unfair relationships under the Consumer Credit Act 1974 by reason of undisclosed commissions paid by the lender to the customers’ respective brokers.
• Acted for various high street banks and finance houses in proceedings to enforce their security over real property for various types of lending, including Regulated Consumer Credit Agreements and Regulated Mortgage Contracts.
• Acted for a factoring company in an application to join its client into a claim brought by the factor to collect a debt owed to the client by one of its customers. A key issue in the case was whether a non-assignment clause had been effectively incorporated into the contract between the client and the customer.
• Advised a large factoring company in a case valued at over £100,000 on whether its client’s terms of business had been validly incorporated into a supply of goods contract with the debtor and the enforceability of exemption clauses.
• Acted for a major high street bank in successfully resisting an application for a mandatory injunction and obtaining indemnity costs in the High Court. The case involved a foreign exchange transaction, where an importer of goods based in Africa, who believed it was paying invoices from its European supplier, was fraudulently induced into paying money into an account held with the bank.
• Represented a finance house in a claim to enforce a personal guarantee and indemnity given by a director of a restaurant business to secure an asset finance agreement. Successfully applied to strike out the director’s defence, obtained summary judgment and indemnity costs.
• Acted for a major high street bank in a claim brought by a retail customer who had been the victim of a cryptocurrency investment telephone fraud.
• Acted for a major high street bank in a claim brought by a high net worth customer to challenge the bank’s refusal to grant a mortgage. Successfully resisted an application by the customer for relief from sanctions, resulting in the claim being struck out, obtained a declaration that the claim was totally without merit and unreasonableness costs on the indemnity basis.
• Acted for a private purchaser in a claim brought by a bank for the return of a motor vehicle worth over £100,000 in circumstances where the bank had bailed the vehicle to its customer under a conditional sale agreement and, in breach thereof, the customer had sold the vehicle to the purchaser.

Ololade has experience in general commercial litigation. He accepts instructions to advise, draft or provide advocacy in relation to:

• Breach of contract and the interpretation of contracts.
• Undue influence.
• Debt claims.
• Sale of goods and supply of goods and services.

Recent cases:

• Advised on the merits of a claim for undue influence valued at $500,000.
• Acted for a utility company in various service-related claims brought against it by customers and members of the public.
• Defended one of the UK’s largest car manufacturers in a claim brought by a well-known sporting personality. The primary question in the case was whether the parties had entered into an introducer agreement under which the claimant would be paid commissions for introducing to the defendant celebrities it later sponsored.
• Acted for a large local authority in a claim brought against it by one of its external care services providers for unpaid invoices. Successfully obtained an order setting aside a default judgment of over £100,000.
• Successfully represented one of the UK’s largest estate agencies in various claims against a number of the agency’s landlords who had attempted to evade the payment of contractual commissions.
• Represented the UK subsidiary of a US biopharmaceutical company in a claim against an international accountancy firm. The primary issue in the case was whether the parties had entered into a binding contract for services or were still in pre-contractual negotiations.

Ololade accepts all appropriate instructions in this area. His experience includes:

• Winding up and bankruptcy petitions.
• Bankruptcy annulments.
• Advising in disputes relating to preferences and transactions at an undervalue.
• Advising in applications for declarations and an order for possession and sale.

Recent cases:

• Obtaining orders for the substituted service of bankruptcy petitions.
• Advising a former bankrupt on the removal of bankruptcy notices and restrictions against their property from the Land Register almost 10 years after being discharged from bankruptcy.
• Appearing in various hearings of winding up petitions in the High Court.
• Appearing in various hearings of bankruptcy petitions in the County Court.

Ololade has a developing practice in company law and partnership, and accepts instructions relating to:

• Directors’ duties.
• Shareholder disputes.
• Unfair prejudice petitions.
• Derivative actions.
• Partnership disputes.

Recent cases:

• Acted for a hunting club in resisting an application for pre-action disclosure by the hunt’s supporters association. The association was attempting to prevent a merger between the hunt and another hunting club by challenging the validity of a vote at the hunt’s AGM in favour of the merger.

Ololade’s experience in property includes:

• Possession proceedings, including possession claims by mortgagees, LPA Receivers and charge holders.
• Stays of warrants and writs.
• Setting aside of possession orders.
• Anti-social behaviour injunctions, including attaching powers of arrest.
• Committal proceedings for breach of injunction.
• Disrepair and dilapidations.

Ololade has an interest in developing the commercial elements of his property litigation practice and accepts all appropriate instructions in this area.

Recent cases:

• Successfully resisted an application to set aside a possession order obtained by a finance company on grounds that the applicant had an overriding interest that took priority to the lender’s charge.
• Acted for various high street banks and finance houses in proceedings to enforce their security over real property for various types of lending, including Regulated Consumer Credit Agreements and Regulated Mortgage Contracts,
• Obtaining an order for sale of property against which a property management company had obtained a charging order securing a money judgment.
• Acted for a private landlord in a forfeiture claim on grounds of failure by a leaseholder to pay service charges and ground rent.
• Represented various private landlords in claims for possession on grounds of rent arrears.
• Represented one of the largest housing associations in the UK in proceedings to obtain possession of let properties, the tenancies of which were obtained by fraud.
• Appearing in various hearings in the First Tier Tribunal (Property Chamber).
• Appearing in the High Court in applications to stay various writs of execution.

• BPTC, Very Competent (“Outstanding” in, amongst others, Civil Litigation, Evidence and Remedies), University of Law, Birmingham, 2015
• LLB (Hons) (Law with Business Studies), University of Birmingham, 2012

• BPTC Award, University of Law, 2014
• HH Paul Clark Scholarship, Middle Temple, 2014
• Accenture Strategy Prize (Business), University of Birmingham, 2012
• Birmingham Scholarship, University of Birmingham, 2012

Yoruba

• Commercial Bar Association (COMBAR).
• British Nigeria Law Forum (BNLF) and Co-Head of the Junior Lawyers Division (JLD).
• The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple.

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