Complaint about my solicitor

Davina_Hart

Hi,
We sold and bought a new built house with a solicitor firm based in London. Throughout the process of buying and selling they have been sluggish in their work due to which exchange was delayed for a couple of weeks and in between solicitor went on holiday for a couple of weeks without informing us and another person took over our case. After a lot of chase and I was partially doing their job we finally completed in first week of July 2018.
Since then I have been chasing them to register our property with land registry but they keep telling us there is a backlog of files with land registry and hence it has already taken 3.5 months and it may take even longer.
At the time of our completion on a new built home, three of my neighbors completed on the same day too and all of them have their property registered. When I called land registry they could not locate any file or documentation for registration of our property.
Our solicitor is adamant that they have sent the information and we must wait until they get the property registered which according to them could take upto 6 months.
This solicitor firm has already given us a lot of stress, they don't return our calls and emails and it came to the point where I stressed to raise a formal complaint but till date there is no response from their side.
My question really is can I take them to legal ombudsman to speed up the process.

Regards,

Davina

Slithery

Davina_Hart wrote: »

My question really is can I take them to legal ombudsman to speed up the process.

Only once you've exhausted their official internal complaints procedure without getting a satisfactory outcome. Have you started this process yet?

G_M

Davina_Hart wrote: »

When I called land registry they could not locate any file or documentation for registration of our property.

I would see if you can get this confrmed by the LR in writing. Then forward this to the appropriate person/dept (check the firm's internal complaints process and use that) and ask for a formal response.


You could also try posting on the Land Registry thread here.

Thrugelmir

Davina_Hart wrote: »

My question really is can I take them to legal ombudsman to speed up the process.

Why should your application take precedence at Land Registry over others?

VfM4meplse

Thrugelmir wrote: »

Why should your application take precedence at Land Registry over others?

Do you not think its odd that a backlog suddenly escalates? If the solicitor had submitted on complteion, their should be reason for the difference between the OP and her neighbours.

HWG

We were in a similar issue - we had a terrible solicitor, ignored our communications and huffily rejected our complaints.

We took them to the ombudsman, who ruled in our favour. It was all easy - we spent a couple of hours putting together a coherent description of our complaint, backed up by evidence, and sent it over by email.

You'll need to figure out what you want the ombudsman to do - in this case, I imagine you want them to instruct your solicitor to complete the job within a reasonable timeframe.

It's hard to tell at this point whether your registration is in a queue at the Land Registry (and that's not going to do you any harm, nor is it your solicitors fault). But if the LR are denying having any paperwork, it sounds like your solicitors may have dropped the ball and are now denying it.

G_M is right - if you can get something in writing then you can get a final response from the solicitor and if you're still deadlocked, proceed to the ombudsman.

Davina_Hart

Thanks all for taking time to respond.
I am now going to liaise with land registry to confirm in writing before reaching out to legal ombudsman.

ReadingTim

Davina_Hart wrote: »

Thanks all for taking time to respond.
I am now going to liaise with land registry to confirm in writing before reaching out to legal ombudsman.

No, you "reach out to the legal ombudsman" only after you've exhausted the firm's internal complaints process. As you've been asked once before, have you even started this process, let alone exhausted it?

Until you do that, you will get no further with the ombudsman than you have with the firm itself, ie nowhere!

hazyjo

Davina_Hart wrote: »

Throughout the process of buying and selling they have been sluggish in their work due to which exchange was delayed for a couple of weeks and in between solicitor went on holiday for a couple of weeks without informing us and another person took over our case. After a lot of chase and I was partially doing their job we finally completed in first week of July 2018.

You can't really complain that exchange was delayed. This is never a date set in stone, just a date you are aiming for. It often changes!


You say you completed in the first week of July, but we don't know when you started the process. How long did it take overall? I don't see how you can complain about it being slow either. Some take longer than others. Not all solicitors are quick, not all are comparable, and you don't know how thorough the others have been. Perhaps they used the developer's recommended/associated solicitor which may be quicker, but certainly not advised!