Is it Worth Complaining About Solicitors?

martindow

Solicitors handled the conveyance of a house I sold in 2006. Errors in this left me with a liability which should have been transferred to the buyers. In 2008 - 2009 I was pursued for about £5000. The solicitors tried to remedy the situation but again mishandled it culminating in me receiving a CCJ after they failed to file a defence in time. I told them to stop acting for me at this point, got the CCJ set aside and paid off the debt. Recently I have successfully recovered from the house buyers the money which I had had to pay.

There is no financial loss to be recovered but I would like your opinions on whether there is any purpose in pursuing a complaint against the solicitors. The 2006 solicitor has retired and is no longer practising but the solicitor involved in 2008-2009 is still with the firm.

I am long past feeling vindictive, but would continuing and escalating the complaint make the solicitor more careful in the future or just be a waste of my time and effort?

clutton_2

dont waste your time - especially if there is no financial gain to be had for yourself... Complaints to Solicitors - just like complaints to ANY professional body, be it CORGI, NICEI, FMB , whoever, - are just paid lipservice to as these bodies are there to protect the interests of the professional, not the customers....

it is utterly galling tho - all you can do it tell as many local people as possible so they lose custom in future.....

i took a solicitor to a small claims court for a loss of 4k - i lost because the sols were sooo incompetent they did not even realise that the SCC was not able to hear the case and that they should not have even filed a defence but asked the court to throw it out... (should have been in a higher more expensive court - what does THAT tell you )

Welsh_Totster

We (my husband and I) complained to the solicitor we used to sell our flat in Surrey 8 years ago as we found out that he had not redeemed our mortgage with C&G when we moved but kept the money in his bank account for 3 or more weeks instead, resulting in us paying a mortgage payment for a property we no longer owned.

We went down the official complaints procedure at his law firm, to which we got no response on several occasions. So we took it up with the Law Society and they took our case on. He refused to speak to them or provide the files they requested over a period of a year.

Anyway cutting a long story short, it went to court, and we found out that we were not the only people he had dont this too, 8 other people had filed the same complaint. We asked for compensation to cover phone calls, letters and a trip to visit him (in vain and 200 miles away) totalling £400, and the cost of the mortgage payment we paid on the flat we no longer owned (£600)

The judge ruled against him, we got our money and a resolved case, he got a £25k fine and had his conveyancing licene taken off him for 12 months, with the Law Society keeping a very close eye on him from then on.

So I would say, you have nothing to loose by complaining, and you may not be the only person that has happened to, if it stops someone else being messed around then its worth it.

martindow

Thank for the replies.

WT - did you go through the Legal Complaints Service or directly to the Law Society? For the sake of writing a few letters I think I will continue. I suspect that where a solicitor has made a mess of things once he is likely to do so repeatedly, so unless these things are flagged up nothing will happen.

Welsh_Totster

Martin I think it was the Legal Complaints Service we went to first who took the case on..... they had no luck getting any info out of him and eventually it went up to the Law Society. I remember dealing with someone before it went to the LS so it could well have been them.

Nosht

martindow wrote: »

Solicitors handled the conveyance of a house I sold in 2006. Errors in this left me with a liability which should have been transferred to the buyers. In 2008 - 2009 I was pursued for about £5000. The solicitors tried to remedy the situation but again mishandled it culminating in me receiving a CCJ after they failed to file a defence in time. I told them to stop acting for me at this point, got the CCJ set aside and paid off the debt. Recently I have successfully recovered from the house buyers the money which I had had to pay.

There is no financial loss to be recovered but I would like your opinions on whether there is any purpose in pursuing a complaint against the solicitors. The 2006 solicitor has retired and is no longer practising but the solicitor involved in 2008-2009 is still with the firm.

I am long past feeling vindictive, but would continuing and escalating the complaint make the solicitor more careful in the future or just be a waste of my time and effort?

Remember that it is not the individual that your are suing but the firm.
Maybe a rival firm in the same area would be interested in proceding with this . . . :eek:

Regards,


N.

martindow

Nosht wrote: »

Remember that it is not the individual that your are suing but the firm.
Maybe a rival firm in the same area would be interested in proceding with this . . . :eek:

Regards,


N.

This might help in Clutton's case but in mine I have not suffered any financial loss as I eventually succeeded in reclaiming the debt from my house buyers.

I am more concerned with raising an issue about a firm of solicitors.

There could be a series of problems, none desperately serious in themselves, but collectively showing a seriously substandard firm. I think for this reason I will continue so that it would be on their file were more problems to occur in the future.

Troubled_Joe

I'm afraid that the Legal Complaints Service won't look at it after 6 months of either the problem arising or the problem being discovered.

The Law Society are the "trade union" if you will, who represent solicitors' interests so will not touch it.

The Solicitor's Regulation Authority are unlikely to look at it unless there has been a serious breach of prof conduct rather than just negligence/poor service.

The organisations above are the 3 bodies which fulfill functions previously all dealt with by the Law Society.

martindow

Troubled_Joe wrote: »

I'm afraid that the Legal Complaints Service won't look at it after 6 months of either the problem arising or the problem being discovered.

The Law Society are the "trade union" if you will, who represent solicitors' interests so will not touch it.

The Solicitor's Regulation Authority are unlikely to look at it unless there has been a serious breach of prof conduct rather than just negligence/poor service.

The organisations above are the 3 bodies which fulfill functions previously all dealt with by the Law Society.

I wrote formally to the solicitors about 2 months ago which was within 6 months of sacking them. They have not replied to this beyond an acknowledgement.

Do you think I am out of time to pursue this?

Troubled_Joe

I must admit I'm not sure on that one. I'm assuming by your question that the 6 months have now passed but the fact that you raised it directly within the timescale may allow it to be considered.

It's certainly worth a call to the LCS just to check.

Richard_Webster

Did you not incur any costs in dealing with the whole matter?

I would have thought that something could be recovered from the solicitors because of their apparent negligence.