Solicitor complaint.

ethan

ethan

ethan

Soldato
Joined
16 Sep 2005
Posts
7,876
Location
What used to be a UK
Anybody know the procedure for seeking recompense from an inept solicitor? Over 12 months ago I went to see one about an injury sustained from a faulty piece of electrical equipment that required me to receive medical attention for six months. The Solicitor indicated the fault and the complaint should be directed at the retailer. Anyway from day one things did not run smoothly as the solicitor got all the details wrong when trying to argue my case to the solicitors acting for the retailer. What actually ensued between them descended in to a farce with the retailer accusing me of not being able to get my facts right due to what I perceived as my solicitors incompetence.

I have actually been requesting a meeting with my solicitor for the last six to eight months to rectify the above mentioned problems only for him to ignore me. I told him to either write me or email me as my phone will block his switchboard as an unknown number. I have emailed him, visited his office twice and his other branches only to be told he is unavai lable and will get in touch later. Suffice it to say he never does. I have been forced to see another solicitor in his branch to raise an official complaint where I was told they would contact me yesterday. I still haven't heard from them (yet).
 
They should be part of some kind of recognised body which you can complain to. Details should be on their website.
 
solicitors must follow SRA regulations...if you have a complaint then:

1) ask for a copy of the solicitors complaints policy
2) put in writing exactly what your complaint is.

The solicitor will then have to reply to you in writing addressing your complaint.
As an example the firm I work for acknowledges complaints within 2 days and gives formal responses with 28 days (no, i'm not personally a solicitor)

The ombudsman will not hear your complaint unless you've gone through the solicitor first, if the solicitor doesn't respond then you can go to the ombudsman.

Just keep copies and dates of your complaint and go from there.
 
Update on this: Three weeks or therabouts have elapsed since submitting an official complaint. I spoke to a different solicitor who assured me their complaints manager would be dealing with it an contact me within a few days. Suffice it to say nobody has been in touch so I'll give it another week before going to the law society. Absolutely disgraceful and unprofessional behaviour on their part. I've not looked in to the Law Society part yet but I hope this particular solicitors branch can be fined and sued.
 
Last edited:
dowie said:
law society - I thought it was the ombudsman you'd go to?
Click to expand...

You are probably correct. I'll check it out within the next seven days as they will have had twenty eight days. Unfortunately my complaint is against one of the directors so I don't know if he would have had any influence concerning the official complaint?
 
Either way, there will be very specific requirements, firstly for saying they are investigating your complaint, and secondly for providing the response to your complaint in a timely fashion.
He can't change something they might have as a statute, or agreement with their professional bodies. Solicitors oddly enough get sued regularly (as a profession, not individually), their professional indemnity insurance is usually considerable.
 
ethan said:
Update on this: Three weeks or therabouts have elapsed since submitting an official complaint. I spoke to a different solicitor who assured me their complaints manager would be dealing with it an contact me within a few days. Suffice it to say nobody has been in touch so I'll give it another week before going to the law society. Absolutely disgraceful and unprofessional behaviour on their part. I've not looked in to the Law Society part yet but I hope this particular solicitors branch can be fined and sued.
Click to expand...

Chances are they will have had to refer your complaint to their insurers for their opinion on how to proceed, from my experience they usually want sight of any letter going out before it's sent to you but that's about it. 3 weeks is pushing it for a response, but you need to have not heard from them for 8 weeks before taking it up with the ombudsman but you could try after 4-5. Send them a chaser.

http://www.sra.org.uk/consumers/problems/report-solicitor.page#legal-ombudsman

The Legal Services Ombudsman deals with complaints about poor service. Poor service includes failures to keep you properly informed about your legal matter. The SRA deals with failures to comply with professional obligations such as a duty to keep your affairs confidential or duty to act honestly and with integrity.
Click to expand...

ethan said:
You are probably correct. I'll check it out within the next seven days as they will have had twenty eight days. Unfortunately my complaint is against one of the directors so I don't know if he would have had any influence concerning the official complaint?
Click to expand...

He shouldn't have, it should be someone different dealing with it.


I assume you have records of your requests for a meeting over the last 7-8 months?
 
Last edited:
edscdk said:
details if injury or it never happened
Click to expand...

Well I was climing up the drain pipe because I had locked myself out of the house when I went shopping - I slipped and fell on the shopping bags and a bottle of Heinz Tomato Ketchup penatrated my .... I was using an electrical winch at the time and it failed

Is that a good enough?
 
Last edited:
The whole 'legal aid' thing was a way to extract tax payers money and into solicitors pockets - it was as crooked as it gets, but it looked good for the masses to get free legal assistance in their hour of need - unless ofcourse you were an hard working tax payer because you can't claim it - it was only any good for the scum bags that lived off crime in the main.
 
scotty365 said:
Well I was climing up the drain pipe because I had locked myself out of the house when I went shopping - I slipped and fell on the shopping bags and a bottle of Heinz Tomato Ketchup penatrated my .... I was using an electrical winch at the time and it failed

Is that a good enough?
Click to expand...

What size bottle of sauce we talking here?
 
Was it a squeezy bottle or a glass one because I've seen a video with a glass one and it doe not end well! :eek:
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom