Complaints procedure
Information about our own process, and raising concerns to the legal ombudsman and to us
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, please contact us with the details.
What will happen next?
Our Compliance Director Lauren Burgess, will send you a letter, email or contact you by telephone to acknowledge receipt of your complaint within 5 working days of receiving it. You will also at this stage be provided with a copy of this procedure if you haven’t already received a copy.
We will then investigate your complaint. This will normally involve passing your complaint to our Compliance Director or to the Head of Department, who will thoroughly review your matter file and speak to the member of staff who acted for you.
The Compliance Director or the Head of Department will send you a detailed written reply to your complaint, including suggestions for resolving the matter, within 8 weeks of the acknowledgment of your complaint. This will confirm our findings and set out our position on your complaint and explaining our reasons. The time scale of 8 weeks is in line with the Legal Ombudsman recommendations but we will endeavour to provide a response well within this time period.
If you remain dissatisfied with our response, then you can then contact the Legal Ombudsman at PO Box 6167, Slough, SL1 0EH, telephone 0300 555 0333, Email: [email protected] and ask them to consider your complaint, alternatively you can contact the SRA by clicking the following link SRA | Problems with law firms and individuals | Solicitors Regulation Authority SRA, The Cube, 199 Wharfside Street, Birmingham, B1 1RN telephone 0370 606 2555
Any complaint to the Legal Ombudsman must usually be made within 6 months of receiving our written response about your complaint or within 1 year of the act or omission about which you are complaining.
If for any reason we have to change any of the timescales set out above, we will let you know and explain why.
For further information, please see the Legal Ombudsman’s website at www.legalombudsman.org.uk
There are Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) entities which are approved to deal with your complaint. You can find specific information about the different ADR providers if you visit their websites:- Trading Standard, Law Society, Bar Standards Board, CILEx Regulations and Council for Licensed Conveyancers.