Complaints

We want to give our clients the best possible service. However, if at any point you become unhappy or concerned about the services we have provided, you should inform us immediately so we can do our best to resolve the problem.

Please get in touch with your case manager (or main point of contact) to raise your concerns and we will do our best to resolve any issues as soon as possible.

Edward Cardington is the firm’s Compliance Officer for Legal Practice (COLP) and has overall responsibility for Complaints.

What to do if we cannot resolve your concerns and you would like to make a formal complaint:

Please be assured that making a complaint will not affect how we handle your matter. Please write to us at [email protected] setting out the details of your complaint. We will aim to acknowledge receipt of your complaint within 5 business days of receiving it and provide you with a guide on next steps.

We will then investigate your complaint. This will normally involve passing your complaint to a member of our senior team, who will review your matter file and speak to the relevant members of staff. You will receive a detailed written reply to your complaint including suggestions for resolving the matter and offering to answer any questions within 21 business days of the aforementioned acknowledgment, together with an invitation to discuss the matter further by telephone.

If following the exchange described above you are still not satisfied, you should contact us again and we will arrange for someone else unconnected with the matter at the firm to review the decision. We will write to you within 14 business days of receiving your request for a review, confirming our final position on your complaint and explaining our reasons.

If your complaint has not been resolved to your satisfaction within 8 weeks following the making of a complaint you may have a right to complain to the Legal Ombudsman (see further below).

Alternatively, if our complaints procedure has been exhausted, you remain dissatisfied, and you would like to escalate matters further, please contact us again to request we engage an alternative dispute resolution (ADR) approved body which would be competent to deal with the complaint.

Legal Ombudsman

The Legal Ombudsman investigates complaints about service issues with lawyers. If we are unable to resolve your complaint, then you can have the complaint independently looked at by the Legal Ombudsman. This applies if you are an individual, a business with fewer than 10 employees and turnover or assets not exceeding a certain threshold, a charity or trust with a net income of less than £1m, or if you fall within certain other categories (you can find out more from the Legal Ombudsman). The Legal Ombudsman will look at your complaint independently and it will not affect how we handle your matter.

Before accepting a complaint for investigation, the Legal Ombudsman will check that you have tried to resolve your complaint with us first.

The Legal Ombudsman expects complaints to be made to them within one year of the date of the act or omission about which you are concerned or within one year of you realising there was a concern.

You must also refer your concerns to the Legal Ombudsman within six months of our final response to you.

If you would like more information about the Legal Ombudsman, please contact them using the details provided below:

Legal Ombudsman contact details

Visit: www.legalombudsman.org.uk

Call: 0300 555 0333 between 9.00 to 17.00

Email: [email protected]

Legal Ombudsman, PO Box 6167, Slough, SL1 0EH.

What to do if you are unhappy with us

The Solicitors Regulation Authority can help if you are concerned about our behaviour. This could be for things like dishonesty, taking or losing your money or treating you unfairly because of your age, a disability or other characteristic.

Visit their website at https://www.sra.org.uk/consumers/problems/ to see how you can raise your concerns with the Solicitors Regulation Authority. You can also report an individual or firm by following the guidance at https://www.sra.org.uk/consumers/problems/report-solicitor/.

This complaints policy was last reviewed in October 2023.