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Complaints Procedure

We are committed to providing a high-quality legal service to each individual client. 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, please write or send an email to 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 acknowledging receipt within two 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 a day of receiving your complaint.

 

We will acknowledge your reply to our acknowledgement letter and confirm what will happen next. You can expect to hear from us within a day of your reply.

 

We will then start to investigate your reply. This may involve one or more of the following steps:

 

  • If we acted for you, we will consider your complaint again. We will then send you our detailed reply or invite you to a meeting to discuss the matter. We will do this within 10 working days.

 

  • If someone else acted for you, we will ask him/her to give us his/her reply to your complaint within five days. We will do this within a day.

 

  • We will then examine the reply and the information in your complaint file. We may also speak to the person who acted for you. We will do this within three working days of receiving the reply and the file.

 

  • We will ask another independent local solicitor to investigate your complaint and report to us. We will do this within three working days.

 

We will then write inviting you to meet and discuss and, we hope, resolve your complaint. We will do this within three working days.

 

Within two working days of the meeting, we will write to you to confirm what took place and any solutions we have agreed with you. If you do not want a meeting or it is not possible, we will send you a detailed reply to your complaint. This will include our suggestions for resolving the matter. We will do this within five working days of completing our investigation.

 

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

 

  • We will review the decision ourselves within five working days;

 

  • We will arrange for someone who is not connected with the complaint to review our decision. We will do this within ten working days;

 

  • We will ask our local Law Society or another local firm of solicitors to review your complaint within ten working days. We will let you know how long this process will take; or

 

  • We will invite you to agree to independent mediation within five working days. We will let you know how long this will take.

 

We will let you know the result of the review within five working 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. If we have not resolved the matter to your satisfaction, you may refer the matter to the Legal Ombudsman. The Legal Ombudsman will normally only deal with complaints from members of the public, very small businesses, charities, clubs and trusts. Please contact the Ombudsman direct to clarify whether he will consider your complaint. Your complaint must be normally made to the Legal Ombudsman within 6 months of your receiving our final decision on your complaint. You may contact the Legal Ombudsman at:


Office of the Legal Ombudsman
6806
Wolverhampton
WV1 9WJ

Telephone: 0300 555 0333
Email: enquiries@legalombudsman.org.uk
Web-site: www.legalombudsman.org.uk

 

If we have to change any of the timescales above, we will let you know and explain why.

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