Can I make a complaint about vendors solicitor?

Legacy_user

After over two years of searching, myself and my partner finally found a house we love and had our offer accepted over a month ago. The sellers were in a position to move quickly and being first time buyers so are we. We have been very much on the ball with everything, immediately appointed a solicitor, provided all necessary documentation, had survey done and formal mortgage offer sent to our solicitor within about ten days of offer being accepted. Everything appeared to be moving along nice and quickly and we even began packing and picking furniture!

Then came the time to let our respective solicitors get on with their bit. We researched our solicitor and chose him for his good reputation of getting things turned around and completed in good time. However, our sellers solicitor has been a nightmare! He will not respond to any communication from our solicitor, the estate agent, or even the sellers themselves! It has been just over a month since the memorandum of sale and he has not even sent out contract papers, despite my solicitor sending regular requests by both letter and email, EA leaving phone messages and emails, and even his own clients pressing him to get on with things.

I'm more than frustrated, and becoming increasingly angry with the situation. Does anybody have any advise as to what we can do, short of camping outside his offices and refusing to leave until we have contracts in hand!?

Am I able to make a complaint to the firm of solicitors about his laziness/incompetence? Could I make a complaint to the ombudsman? Surely there is some form of action we could take to finally get some progress.

Grateful for any suggestions.

Davesnave

You have no contract with the seller's solicitor so you cannot complain to them or about them in the formal way you suggest, but you may certainly give vent to your frustration via the seller's agent.

The sellers are the ones who should be doing the complaining, taking the matter higher, if necessary.

System

I have wondered why the sellers are tolerating the matter themselves, as we've been in touch with them directly and know they're as frustrated as we are. I feel like asking them to sack him and set on somebody who's not so lazy but that does seem a tad cheeky!

AdrianC

A month, and no draft contract?

That's not ridiculously long, and it's entirely possible the vendor is the cause of the delay - whatever he might be telling you.

System

No ridiculously long, but as it's the first stage of the transaction for him and from what I understand not a particularly complicated procedure I would have thought he might have got round to it by now. And simply ignoring everyone's communication is just arrogant!

I've no reason to believe the vendor is holding things up as they actually contacted the EA to ask what the delay was, thinking something at our end was the cause. We were already aware that they have some fairly pressing family commitments that necessitate a fairly quick move so it is in their interests to get things moving along.

kinger101

Are you sure it's not the vendor holding things up for some reason? The solicitor won't respond if they've not actually been appointed.

System

As I pointed out in previous post, the sellers actually have more reason to want to move quickly than we do, us being just impatient first time buyers. Having been in contact with them I am aware that they have repeatedly tried to hurry their solicitor along. His details are available to me when I log onto the EA website, hence I was considering emailing him myself, or contacting his firm or a senior partner there to make a complaint of some kind.

davidmcn

inappropriateadult wrote: »

I was considering emailing him myself, or contacting his firm or a senior partner there to make a complaint of some kind.

Well, don't. You don't have the right to complain about the service somebody else is getting from their solicitor, and they're not allowed to enter into any discussions directly with you anyway.

Owain_Moneysaver

You can't even contact the vendor's solicitor as they are acting for the other party.

Your remedy is for your solicitor to tell the vendor's solicitor that you will pull out of the purchase if xxx is not done by yyy

Cakeguts

This has only been going on for a month and you are getting impatient. It could take you over 6 months to buy this house. Buying a house isn't instant. You still have to have patience and wait as long as it takes. If not withdraw your offer and look for something else but even if you find another house there is no guarantee that it will be any quicker.

System

I do appreciate that we're at an early stage in the purchase, and I'd be happy as long as I knew that something was happening, whereas at the moment things have stalled completely despite everyone's best efforts to make some progress, and his failure to respond to even his own clients requests are just plain irritating.

I really don't want to threaten to pull out of the sale as I've really no intention of actually doing so, as we've spent well over two years finding the house we want and have our hearts set on this place. I just can't get over the fact that one solicitors total inactivity can cause such an unnecessary standstill in proceedings. I'm more than aware that there is still a long way to go, and if he carries on like this through every stage of the transaction then our mortgage offer will have expired by the time he gets his backside into gear and we'll have to start again from square one.

I suppose our only option is to sit and twiddle our thumbs till he decides he can be bothered, but can't help but think there should be some kind of rule to ensure this kind of situation shouldn't just be accepted as part of the house buying process.