nightmare conveyancer

bobwilson

We've been down this road before and stung twice by bad conveyancers. This time, it seems to be a repeat only in a different format. How on earth do you find a good conveyancer if you don't know anyone who can recommend? We have read all small print, and interviewed them, they seem good and make promises before you sign up, but when they have you signed up, their service suddenly deteriorates. We're at our wits end.

We decided to go with a more expensive conveyancer (£1400) because she assured us she was fast and guaranteed to answer queries within 24 hours. Since we signed up with her, she's rarely available on the phone, doesn't answer queries within 24 hours (sometimes weeks), we often get told to deal with her assistant(s), as she's too busy. She sent us the title deed to read through and check, and 2 weeks later it turns out she hasn't even read it herself.

We hired her over 2 months ago. I just spoke to her on the phone, and got the impression she still hasn't even read the covenants. She started talking about Fairbriar's Homes having built the house. But it's written in the deeds & paperwork that they didn't build it, it's one of the first things written on the first page of the title deeds. It states the seller bought the land from Mr & Mrs [xxxxx] at no. 47 [bla bla] , the neighbours, and built his own house. He She doesn't even seem to know the most basic thing about our house purchase.

One of the convenants states that there must be no buildings within 1.5metres of a certain area, where there are underground electric wires. However, we have a question mark over whether or not the house is built within this distance. We told her we needed to see the written confirmation from the electric board that their electric lines are 1.5metres away from the house, and that we won't be liable to have to demolish the house. Our solicitor's reply was: "well, I doubt the seller will be happy if we go asking the electric board that, because they might uncover hidden truths and have to demolish it then. It's best to leave well-enough alone." Is she serious? Is this normal behaviour for a solicitor?

Talking to her more, she suggested "you can get indemnity insurance against it", I asked what this means, and she didn't seem to know. She could barely pronounce the word "indemnity". It feels like I could do a better job learning and doing the conveyancing myself, and I know almost nothing about it.

She kept avoiding my questions, and read the covenants out aloud to me, as if I hadn't already read and understood them. She's had them for weeks, yet seemed to be reading them for the first time.

We really need some advice here.

The last time we tried to buy a house, we had a different solicitor, who gave us a different problem. He would continuously tell us to chase the seller's solicitor for paperwork he'd never requested in the first place, and this happened every week. He'd lie to us that he'd requested paperwork, when he hadn't. Our seller thought he was off his head, and after we asked him to show us his outgoing letters to date, it turned out he had been lying, and had done no work on our case. In the end, we changed solicitor, but the seller got scared it was going to take even longer, so he (understandably) backed out and sold to someone else. We don't want this to happen again, but at the same time, we need advice - what should we do?!

Are there no regulation for solicitors? It seems like I could set myself up as a solicitor tomorrow.

Our solicitor made us these guarantees before we signed up:[FONT=&quot]
1. I am a[/FONT][FONT=&quot] qualified solicitor.[/FONT][FONT=&quot]
2. [/FONT][FONT=&quot]If I am unavailable I will return your call within 24 hours or you can speak with my assistant.[/FONT][FONT=&quot]
3. We will send you regular email updates through the transaction.[/FONT][FONT=&quot]
4. We [/FONT][FONT=&quot]will contact you if we think that there is something that you can do to progress the transaction.[/FONT][FONT=&quot]
[/FONT][FONT=&quot]5. I will be your direct contact from start to finish.

However, she hasn't returned our calls within 24 hours, her assistants don't seem to know anything or do what they say they'll do. We haven't received regular email updates, and she hasn't been our direct contact at all; we always get through to her assistants.

[/FONT] What should we do at this point? We wish there was a government body we could call for help or advice

OGR

First off I am not a solicitor but I work at a small/medium sized solicitors firm in South London.

Just answering a couple of your questions on the complaints side.

Are there no regulation for solicitors? It seems like I could set myself up as a solicitor tomorrow.

Solicitors are regulated by the SRA.

http://www.sra.org.uk/home/home.page

Here is a link to the SRA website about what you should do if you are having a problem with a solicitor.

http://www.sra.org.uk/consumers/problems.page

What should we do at this point? We wish there was a government body we could call for help or advice

There is an ombudsman for the legal sector but you should probably make a complaint to the firm first. Can you find out the contact details of the person in charge? With the firm I work for we have a contact email address on our website that goes to our senior partner, if they have something similar email him/her and make a complaint about the lack of contact with your conveyancer.

http://www.legalombudsman.org.uk/

Gonzo33

Good advice from OGR.

Good luck OP

bobwilson

Thanks, but she IS a senior partner, and we have complained both to her and her assistant, but they were defensive / avoided the point.

OGR

If it is a partnership then there will usually be one equity partner who is top of the chain and pretty much runs everything. You may have the odd managing partner underneath. Also if her title merely says 'Partner' also be aware that she could be a salaried partner which is basically a partner in name alone, still an employee with no equity in the firm. Check the firm's website and if they have a 'people' section you can usually bet that whichever partner appears first in the partner section is the top dog and the one to contact.

If she is the senior partner then I suggest you send her a letter outlining your complaint and keep a copy of both the letter and when you sent it. If you find your complaint is not dealt with with a satisfactory conclusion then either call the SRA and make a complaint or contact the ombudsman.

£1400 is a lot of money to pay and you would expect a very good service with those sorts of fees involved.

bobwilson

PS- our complaint was over the phone, and her assistant assured us something would at least be done to enquire about the convenants we asked about within 24 hours, however, calling back a week later, nothing was done still.

I've just put a small mild complaint in an email, but we so far haven't received any response to our emails for the past few weeks, and we're starting to get !!!!ed off.

OGR

I just checked out the SRA website and unfortunately they do not investigate for unreasonable delays but they suggest.

Issues of poor service should initially be addressed with the firm in question and, if they are not resolved to your satisfaction, should be taken to the Legal Ombudsman. Read more on reporting a solicitor or firm.

If you have made a complaint both over the phone and in writing and it has not been addressed then I think the Ombudsman may now be your next port of call.

There is actually a case study about delays which was dealt with by the Legal Ombudsman on their website.

http://www.legalombudsman.org.uk/stories/case_study04.html

coldcazzie

OGR wrote: »

£1400 is a lot of money to pay and you would expect a very good service with those sorts of fees involved.

Agreed - we paid just over half that and had excellent service from our conveyancers. So much so that I intend to go back to them for any and every house sale/purchase we make in the future.

bobwilson

Sadly, having had to go to the ombudsman for our last solicitor who quoted us £1200 over the phone all included, and then suddenly upped the price to £1800, and even though we hadn't signed anything to agree to £1800, the ombudsman decided in the solicitor's favour. We both heard the solicitor say "you won't pay more than £1200" on the phone, but she denied it. The ombudsman's reasoning was "as the solicitor's firm deals with many clients, it is more likely that their word is more accurate than that of the client.".

If we can't trust the ombudsman to see reason, who can we trust.

That's just the short story. Incredibly, the ombudsman took over 10 months just to reply to our complaint. They said they would get back to us - and after we reminded them a few times over the year, finally, they replied to our 4th reminder. You won't believe what they said: "we cannot deal with your complaint as the [x] month limit has expired." I forget how many months it is. We explained that we had submitted the complaint well within their specified time limit, as well as several reminders! We submitted the complaint as soon as the problem occurred with the solicitor, but the legal ombudsman wouldn't listen.

It took 6 months just to battle the legal ombudsman to get them to agree to investigate!! We had email proof that we had sent in our complaint several times, within their time limit, but they denied receiving it. Eventually, they found some of our emails, but still refused to investigate "because you hadn't contacted us again since your initial complaint" (which we had ! - and received nothing back!).

All in all, it seemed like the legal ombudsman team had too much work, and they just couldn't be bother to deal with the case. It made no sense otherwise.

We had to argue with them and go to the independent adjudicator or some such, who forced them to take on our case - but they still refused - and then the final decision was made that they had to take on the case, because we had submitted it in time, and it was their fault for not replying.

They were completely unreasonable in dealing with our case unfortunately, as above.

It's horrifying that these things can happen. We thought at least the ombudsman is supposed to be reasonable and independent, not to sway towards the solicitor's favour just because they're a large firm.

Fire_Fox

Formal complaints and reminders should be in writing by recorded delivery not e-mail.