In 1975 a young lady called Pauline Lyle-Smith founded the Document Exchange or DX, as it is now known.
The idea behind the DX was to provide a private postal system for conveying documents and letters between (at least initially) law firms and also barristers’ chambers.
Pauline was a young trainee solicitor (or back then “articled clerk”) with a very old-established firm called Eland Hore Patersons (EHP), who practiced out of 24 & 25 Lincoln’s Inn Fields.
An Australian by birth, Pauline had the idea from seeing how a business called “Ozdoc” worked over there. She had also witnessed the crippling effect that recent postal strikes had had on the legal profession and its ability to send and receive documents.
In 1977 our senior partner Paul Taylor joined EHP as a trainee, overlapping very briefly with Pauline who then moved on to pastures new, busy with the ever-expanding DX business. Pauline and Paul have kept in touch over the years, mainly through their contact with other ex EHP personnel, including the housekeeper at Lincoln’s Inn Fields, Vera Ilett, who sadly passed away some years ago.
As Pauline worked at EHP when she set up the DX, this firm was allocated the prestigious “DX2” box number (the DX itself being box DX1).
Then, following its merger with EHP in 1982, Kidd Rapinet held on to the cherished DX2 box number until the firm’s move to the City in 2012. The firm is hoping to persuade the DX to reallocate it original box number when it moves again later this year to its brand new office near Canary Wharf.
The DX has just celebrated its 40th anniversary, marked by a grand dinner in the Great Hall in Lincoln’s Inn, equidistant between EHP’s office in Lincoln’s Inn Fields and the DX’s first office in Chichester Rents, off Chancery Lane. Several partners and members of staff from our London and Slough offices attended this gala event. Photographs taken at the dinner can be seen by clicking on this link: dxgroup.pixieset.com.
The DX is now an international business providing services well beyond simply the legal sector, but its roots and relationship with Kidd Rapinet and its predecessor practice remain part of both organizations’ proud history.