Solicitor woes!

Bodminman

Hi there,

I'd like to have a rant about shoddy solicitors!

Basically we put an offer on a house in late Nov 09 which completed on 29 Jan 10 which I know is a fairly quick turnaround but my issues are more with the incompetence of the solicitor.

When we instructed them in the early Dec 09, we were sent the forms etc and returned them completed within48 hours and all ran smoothly throught the december. Early January I sent the solicitors an email asking them for
the bank details and the date for which they would like the deposit funds available. I got a response saying not to worry as we will be given plenty of notice for this.

On the proposed exchange date (15 Jan) I was contacted by the estate agent who was very annoyed saying that the exchange couldn't go ahead because our solicitor said there was a problem with our deposit! The solicitor never requested it!

So the following Tuesday (19 Jan) we arrange for the transfer of funds as per the completion statement sent to us by the solicitor. A week later I sent the solicitor an email basically asking what the procedure was for the completion date and that I trust everything was in order. His response sent my blood pressure through the roof! He said that he couldn;t complete until the person funding part of out deposit had his identity
verified and also the funds transfered were £30 short. The £30 was down to a typo at the bank but the ID verification was unbelievable as the solicitor was aware of the sources of our deposits when we filled in all their forms! Anyway we managed get the £30 paid and the ID verified and the completiion went ahead. What's got my back up here is that what would have happened if I hadn't sent the email asking what was going to
happen on the completion date!?!

We have now been in the house for about 10 days and yesterday the solicitor telephoned me to say that I still owed them £48 for environment search fees which he missed of the completion statement and that he had sent me an amended completion statement to reflect this and and bill for the £49. This is shocking!

Being self employed I wouldn't dream of contacting one of my customers saying 'Er that invoice I sent you 2.5 weeks ago which you have paid was incorrect as I missed something off
which you now need to pay'.

This is just a few examples of the issues we've had with this solicitor. They pride themselves on doing most thins electronically via the email etc but we've got loads of examples where emails haven't been answered, phonecalls that weren't returned.

What would you do in my situation?

clutton_2

sadly i have had "revised bills" several times from one particular solicitor.... it makes you wonder if accounts departments or solicitors issue invoices to clients.........

sadly, certainly on landlords forums, there are always pleas for "can anyone recommend a good solicitor" and those folks that have a good one, dont share, in case their guy/gal gets inundated with work then gets to join the poor solicitor brigade......

i think as our guru Richard pointed out a few weeks back... much of the results a sol aims for is dependent on others supplying information in a timely fashion....

i suspect that sometimes a good sol is given too many cases to deal with at the same time...

has anyone EVER been told by a firm of sols..... "sorry we cant take your business we are too busy " ??

builders and plumbers and carpenters and roofers will all say this to you... this means they are good workmen and are fully employed....

like all professions/jobs - there are good and bad.. but EAs and sols seem to have a poor reputation... it used to be second hand car salesmen... maybe the Japanese fiasco at the moment means they are about to make a comeback....

Fire_Fox

My experience is you always need to chase your solicitor and the estate agent on a weekly basis: even if yours is decent the other side will be slack! My last purchase (cash buyer, redundant show flat) took a year as the vendor's solicitor lost the deeds in an office move and tried to cover up, the ex-Mr Fire Fox had a failed purchase in 2007 (FTB finances in place, vacant BTL) whereby the vendor's solicitor was having 'personal problems' and forgot to do such basics as contact the freeholder about the service charge!

Bodminman

As I said earlier, this solicitors had prided themselves on doing much of its business via email for client convenience.

We constantly bombarded them with emails and telephone calls and all was ok until the last 4 weeks of the purchase. They hardly replied to messages (both email and telephone) and when I did get through to the humans, they denied ever receiving some of my messages/telephone calls!

Con merchants!

G_M

Have any mortgages the previous owners had been paid off?
Has your stamp duty been paid (either by you or your solicitors)?
Has you purchase been registered at the Land registry? (check here for £4)

If so, then your solicitors have completed their work. Whether you respond speedily to their revised completion statement is up to you..

If not, you are dependant on them completing their work..

PasturesNew

Should have used Chisholms.

jenny_13

Your solicitors sound as bad as mine were, I went all through it saying I'd complain but in the end I was so glad to be rid of chasing them I left it.

timmyt

several issues:

1. did you go cheap with the 'solicitors' (and probably you did not have a solicitor actiung but a clerk) so you may be at fault
2. lawyers juggle 100 clients at a time to be able to offer you such low conveyancing rates. They charge a fraction of the estate agents but take all the risk.
3. the completion statement is only a summary of your own finances, so if you did not take the time to check it - you would have had their quote to compare - when I bet they asked you to check (and you should anyway) then ..well..you both are at fault. some firms do not send a statement, or very late as again, it is just a summary of your own finances

Yes, they need paying as they funded your purchase.

never bombard a solicitor as they can increase fees for that sort of thing.

some clients are high maintenance, and that is a shame as you end up losing a chance to form a chemistry with the solicitor who could be at your call night and day had you been less demanding.

here I agree that failign to take ID until too late, and he didn't give you enough detail about the completion date. on the scake oif things not too bad but you were stressed as you would be in buying so I can see this would not have helped. try and keep them on board if they are worth it....but if you chose a headset opertor go cheap firm then ...well...why!

Bodminman

timmyt wrote: »

several issues:

1. did you go cheap with the 'solicitors' (and probably you did not have a solicitor actiung but a clerk) so you may be at fault

No. we chose a solicitor that we felt suited our position. Ie: doing things electronically meaning no long delays waiting for letters via the postal system.

2. lawyers juggle 100 clients at a time to be able to offer you such low conveyancing rates. They charge a fraction of the estate agents but take all the risk.

3. the completion statement is only a summary of your own finances, so if you did not take the time to check it - you would have had their quote to compare - when I bet they asked you to check (and you should anyway) then ..well..you both are at fault. some firms do not send a statement, or very late as again, it is just a summary of your own finances

This is a section of the Completion statement:
Stamp Duty £xxxx.00
HMLR Fee £200.00
Chancel Check £17.63
Solicitor Costs VAT & Disbursements £446.26

So looking at this I would have taken 'Disbursements' to include the Environment Searches, wouldn't you!?!?!

Yes, they need paying as they funded your purchase.

never bombard a solicitor as they can increase fees for that sort of thing.

some clients are high maintenance, and that is a shame as you end up losing a chance to form a chemistry with the solicitor who could be at your call night and day had you been less demanding.

here I agree that failign to take ID until too late, and he didn't give you enough detail about the completion date. on the scake oif things not too bad but you were stressed as you would be in buying so I can see this would not have helped. try and keep them on board if they are worth it....but if you chose a headset opertor go cheap firm then ...well...why!

We didn't choose cheap, from the quotes we received it was middle'ish in terms of price. I never bombarded them. I just got frustrated when I was sending reqested info back to them and not getting confirmation that they'd received it. They even had a customer console so that I could login and check the progress of my transaction. This was never updates either, hence more emails/telephone calls.

G_M

Frankly it doesn't matter whether you chose cheap or not. Yes, timmyt is right about solicitors (or more likely their clerks) juggling 100 cases, being rushed etc, but they are still professionals, offering a proffessional service.

So whatever they choose to charge, you have a right to expect them to not make mistakes.

GDB2222

So, really, there are two points:

1. The solicitor was inefficient, but everything went through in the end, and you haven't lost out as far as I can see.

2. There is a small supplementary bill for a disbursement, which of course you should grit your teeth and pay.

It was rather poor work at times, but what can you do?

I must say that I have sacked a few clients who have bombarded me with emails etc. It's too dangerous dealing with them, as there may be something important buried somewhere in all those emails.