Taylor Wessing has confirmed the final details of its secretarial redundancy consultation, after a review which has seen the firm introduce a new centralised document service.

The firm has laid off 22 City secretaries after placing 96 London roles under consultation, of which 26 were originally expected to be made redundant. The consultation, which completed last week, began in June.

The move comes after an in-depth review of secretarial resources at the firm, along with the introduction of a new secretarial services desk, which aims to provide document services support to secretaries and fee earners and improve workplace efficiency.

The firm said it will retain its four existing secretarial group leader roles, but create a new role of head of secretarial services, who will report to the firm's COO and oversee a new business services department handling secretarial work.

A host of firms have conducted redundancy reviews this year, including DAC Beachcroft, which cut five City fee-earning roles earlier this month as part of a restructuring of its London employment and pensions practice. The review concluded the team was overstaffed at a senior level, but the firm's partners avoided the cut, with three associates and two solicitors opting to take voluntary redundancy.

Other firms to have made cuts include Berwin Leighton Paisner, which earlier this month said it had cut all of the 102 jobs it had placed under review in May, with 58 legal staff and 44 secretarial staff laid off.

For more, see BLP confirms 102 legal and secretary layoffs as 84% take voluntary offer.