OUR COMPLAINTS PROCEDURE

We are committed to providing a high-quality legal service to all our clients. When something goes wrong we need you to tell us about it. This will help us to improve our standards. If you have a complaint, either in relation to the conduct of your case or our bill contact us with the details.

What will happen next?

• We will send you a letter acknowledging your complaint and asking you to confirm or explain the details set out. We will also let you know the name of the person who will be dealing with your complaint. You can expect to receive our letter within 10 to 14 working days of us receiving your complaint.

• We will record your complaint in our central register and open a separate file for your complaint. We will do this within 7 to 10 working days of receiving your complaint

• We will then start to investigate your complaint. This will normally involve the following steps.

1. 1.  We will pass your complaints to the complaints manager within three to five Days 
   2. The complaint’s manager will ask the member of staff who acted for you to report back to them in relation to your complaint within 10 days
   3. Once a response is received from the individual whom the complaint is about, the complaints manager will examine their reply and the information in your complaint file then, if necessary, may also speak to them. This will take up to 5 days from receiving their reply and the file
   4. The relevant handler will then invite you to a meeting either face to face or by Telephone to discuss and hopefully resolve your complaint.
   5. Within two days of the meeting, the handler will write to you to confirm what took place and any solutions he (or she) has agreed with you. If you do not want a meeting or it is not possible, the handler of your complaint will send you a detailed reply to your complaint. This will include his (or her) suggestions for resolving the matter. He (or she) will do this within five days of completing the investigation.

 At this stage, if you are still not satisfied you contact us again. We will then arrange to review our decision. This will happen in one of the following ways.

• A partner of the firm will review the decision made by your complaints handler within 10 days.
• We will invite you to agree to independent mediation within five days. We will let you know how long this process will take.

 We will let you know the result of the review within five days of the end of the review. At this time, we will write to you confirming our final position on your complaint and explaining our reasons.

FOR COMPLAINTS IN ENGLAND AND WALES

Legal Ombudsman

If the complaint is not resolved to your satisfaction and you wish to involve an outside body, then you can contact the Legal Ombudsman service ( www.legalombudsman.org.uk) on 0300 555 0333. 

In normal circumstances, the Legal Ombudsman expects you to allow us 8 weeks to try to resolve your complaint before contacting them, and complaints should be made within six months of the date of the conclusion of the Firm’s complaints procedure.  For more information on complaint procedures download the  Legal Ombudsman Guide and procedures .  This can also be downloaded from the Legal Ombudsman service website.

Please note that that there may also be a right to object to the bill by applying to the court for an assessment of the bill under Part III of the Solicitors Act 1974; and that if all or part of a bill remains unpaid the firm may be entitled to charge interest. If your first language is not English or you find it difficult to read our complaints procedure, please tell us which language you read and we will endeavor to have a complaints procedure translated into your preferred language.

Contacting the Legal Ombudsman

E-mail: enquiries@legalombudsman.org.uk

Website: www.legalombudsman.org.uk

Telephone: 03005550333

Write: Legal Ombudsman, PO Box 6167, Slough, SL1 0EH

Time limits for The Legal Ombudsman

The Legal Ombudsman aims to resolve complaints and assist clients and their solicitors to reach a mutual agreement. There are, however, time limits for submitting complaints to them. These time limits also apply for referrals to the Financial Ombudsman

Within six months of receiving our final response
Eight weeks after lodging your complaint with us, if you haven’t received our final response
Within one year of the date of the act/ omission if you haven’t previously complained, or
One year from the date that you should’ve known you had a complaint to pursue and hadn’t complained previously

COMPLAINTS IN SCOTLAND

Referral to the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission

In the unfortunate event that we are not able to resolve your concerns, you may wish to contact the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission (SLCC).

by email at: enquiries@scottishlegalcomplaints.org.uk
by phone on: 0131 201 2130
by post at: Scottish Legal Complaints Commission, The Stamp Office, 10 – 14 Waterloo Place, Edinburgh, EH1 3EG

SLCC Time Limits

The SLCC operates strict time limits for accepting complaints, which require complaints to be made within one (1) year of the service ending or the conduct occurring. However, the SLCC will disregard any time it considers that the complainer was excusably unaware of their concerns.

Referral to the Solicitors Regulation Authority

If you are concerned that we haven’t adhered to the SRA Rules and Regulations, you can report your concerns to the SRA:

Phone: 0370 606 2555 inside the UK or +44 (0)121 329 6800 from overseas

Email report@sra.org.uk

Post: Solicitors Regulation Authority, The Cube, 199 Wharfside Street, Birmingham, B1 1RN