My

csgohan4

There's always 2 sides of the story,. how often did you chase the solicitors? x4 a week? x4 a day?

What issues were outstanding? I had a 'simple' lease entry and that still took 1-2 months to clarify

Was a conveyor belt solicitor on the cheap used?

Define top firm you allegedly used, 'top solicitors' charge 300 plus an hour for their time

All this about I paid my money I expect a 'service' is all relative is it not? You pay the bottom range for solicitors you would get bottom level service, you pay a bit more you would hope you get a bit more service.

No harm in making a complaint to the firm, as others have mentioned you can move firms, but it  may cost and may delay things

[Deleted User]

I just left my solicitor to it, but then again I am quite anxious so I didn't want to bother him... 
He also did a great job, I can imagine if he wasn't doing what he should be I would have chased more! 
There's a good source on here regarding what the process is and I just followed mine along with that, so that I knew everything was going ok. 

camden_kid

fleur8 said:

csgohan4 said: csgohan4 said:

There's always 2 sides of the story,. how often did you chase the solicitors? x4 a week? x4 a day? 

Here’s my side of the story:

• July - contact made to instruct
• August - I did not make contact
• September - I did not make contact
• October - I did not make contact 
• Oct 26th - lots of legal documents received with an invitation for queries
• Oct 28th - I send queries 
• November 11th - I kindly double check my email with queries was received 
• November 13th - I do not ask a question but simply inform the solicitor that I have received my mortgage offer  
• November 16th - Solicitor replies and says he will reply to my queries today..but complains about how many there are and many are repeats (15 questions)
• November 18th - I ask again purely because he said ‘today’
• November 19th - Solicitor replies and says ‘soon’  
• November 23rd - I ask for clarification about what soon means with no pressure, just for my knowledge 

The above is paraphrased and summarised incl dates and phrases. I admit that I did email too many times this particular week, perhaps. But I feel that you shouldn’t introduce a timeline and not expect to be asked about it. 

What issues were outstanding? I had a 'simple' lease entry and that still took 1-2 months to clarify

Legal terminology that I just couldn’t understand. 

Another example: I asked about a specific report/survey provided by the sellers, asking the solicitor to ask the sellers for more information as urgent actions were recommended from the survey and the solicitor replied saying I DO NOT REVIEW YOUR surveys, even though it is clearly not my survey. This is just one example of when the solicitor did not read my question and therefore misunderstood what I was asking. 

Was a conveyor belt solicitor on the cheap used?
 I don’t know what that is. 
Define top firm you allegedly used, 'top solicitors' charge 300 plus an hour for their time
This solicitor is charging £4000 with £300 per hour for extra work. 
All this about I paid my money I expect a 'service' is all relative is it not? You pay the bottom range for solicitors you would get bottom level service, you pay a bit more you would hope you get a bit more service.
I did not pay for a bottom range solicitor for this exact reason. 
No harm in making a complaint to the firm, as others have mentioned you can move firms, but it  may cost and may delay things

I don’t want to make a complaint, nor do I want to change solicitor. I was hoping to find someone else to help me hence my posts but I have every intention of posting on here. 

My answers are in bold, thank you

£4000! 

davidmcn

camden_kid said:

fleur8 said:

csgohan4 said: csgohan4 said:

There's always 2 sides of the story,. how often did you chase the solicitors? x4 a week? x4 a day? 

Here’s my side of the story:

• July - contact made to instruct
• August - I did not make contact
• September - I did not make contact
• October - I did not make contact 
• Oct 26th - lots of legal documents received with an invitation for queries
• Oct 28th - I send queries 
• November 11th - I kindly double check my email with queries was received 
• November 13th - I do not ask a question but simply inform the solicitor that I have received my mortgage offer  
• November 16th - Solicitor replies and says he will reply to my queries today..but complains about how many there are and many are repeats (15 questions)
• November 18th - I ask again purely because he said ‘today’
• November 19th - Solicitor replies and says ‘soon’  
• November 23rd - I ask for clarification about what soon means with no pressure, just for my knowledge 

The above is paraphrased and summarised incl dates and phrases. I admit that I did email too many times this particular week, perhaps. But I feel that you shouldn’t introduce a timeline and not expect to be asked about it. 

What issues were outstanding? I had a 'simple' lease entry and that still took 1-2 months to clarify

Legal terminology that I just couldn’t understand. 

Another example: I asked about a specific report/survey provided by the sellers, asking the solicitor to ask the sellers for more information as urgent actions were recommended from the survey and the solicitor replied saying I DO NOT REVIEW YOUR surveys, even though it is clearly not my survey. This is just one example of when the solicitor did not read my question and therefore misunderstood what I was asking. 

Was a conveyor belt solicitor on the cheap used?
 I don’t know what that is. 
Define top firm you allegedly used, 'top solicitors' charge 300 plus an hour for their time
This solicitor is charging £4000 with £300 per hour for extra work. 
All this about I paid my money I expect a 'service' is all relative is it not? You pay the bottom range for solicitors you would get bottom level service, you pay a bit more you would hope you get a bit more service.
I did not pay for a bottom range solicitor for this exact reason. 
No harm in making a complaint to the firm, as others have mentioned you can move firms, but it  may cost and may delay things

I don’t want to make a complaint, nor do I want to change solicitor. I was hoping to find someone else to help me hence my posts but I have every intention of posting on here. 

My answers are in bold, thank you

£4000! 

Yes, for that I'd expect gold-plated levels of service.

csgohan4

davidmcn said:

camden_kid said:

fleur8 said:

csgohan4 said: csgohan4 said:

There's always 2 sides of the story,. how often did you chase the solicitors? x4 a week? x4 a day? 

Here’s my side of the story:

• July - contact made to instruct
• August - I did not make contact
• September - I did not make contact
• October - I did not make contact 
• Oct 26th - lots of legal documents received with an invitation for queries
• Oct 28th - I send queries 
• November 11th - I kindly double check my email with queries was received 
• November 13th - I do not ask a question but simply inform the solicitor that I have received my mortgage offer  
• November 16th - Solicitor replies and says he will reply to my queries today..but complains about how many there are and many are repeats (15 questions)
• November 18th - I ask again purely because he said ‘today’
• November 19th - Solicitor replies and says ‘soon’  
• November 23rd - I ask for clarification about what soon means with no pressure, just for my knowledge 

The above is paraphrased and summarised incl dates and phrases. I admit that I did email too many times this particular week, perhaps. But I feel that you shouldn’t introduce a timeline and not expect to be asked about it. 

What issues were outstanding? I had a 'simple' lease entry and that still took 1-2 months to clarify

Legal terminology that I just couldn’t understand. 

Another example: I asked about a specific report/survey provided by the sellers, asking the solicitor to ask the sellers for more information as urgent actions were recommended from the survey and the solicitor replied saying I DO NOT REVIEW YOUR surveys, even though it is clearly not my survey. This is just one example of when the solicitor did not read my question and therefore misunderstood what I was asking. 

Was a conveyor belt solicitor on the cheap used?
 I don’t know what that is. 
Define top firm you allegedly used, 'top solicitors' charge 300 plus an hour for their time
This solicitor is charging £4000 with £300 per hour for extra work. 
All this about I paid my money I expect a 'service' is all relative is it not? You pay the bottom range for solicitors you would get bottom level service, you pay a bit more you would hope you get a bit more service.
I did not pay for a bottom range solicitor for this exact reason. 
No harm in making a complaint to the firm, as others have mentioned you can move firms, but it  may cost and may delay things

I don’t want to make a complaint, nor do I want to change solicitor. I was hoping to find someone else to help me hence my posts but I have every intention of posting on here. 

My answers are in bold, thank you

£4000! 

Yes, for that I'd expect gold-plated levels of service.

Depends what the purchase price is, the more it is, the more expensive the legal fees are

BigD74

Sorry, but for £4,000 I would have expected them to respond to me every day if I wanted. We have been quoted less than half that. Definitely complain about the way they treated you. 

I have similar anxiety with our sols. We received our mortgage offer last week, and it’s now all in their hands to move the process along (FTB, new build, no chain). Each day I have to stop myself from chasing them!

youth_leader

Have you got a question fleur8, see if the book is helpful? 

hazyjo

You don't always get what you pay for. Most are charging way less than half. I certainly wouldn't have presumed that by paying up to x3 the amount, I'd get good service. It actually sounds extortionate and may be that they're ripping you off rather than being 'gold star' solicitors.

allIcouldwishfor

olbas_oil said:

A recent family purchase was done via Conveyancing Warehouse. This is not a recommendation (but the individual solicitor who has since moved on was really good). Nor do I know whether they still use the system, but there was a published workflow which was updated every day, and allowed us to know where were in the process, and who was waiting on whom. I can no longer login, but the system used was 'Easy Convey'. The first question I would ask any prospective conveyancer would be whether they used a system like that.
Presumably all solicitors use some sort of system to keep track of cases. Why can't they expose a view of that that to the client? Then it would be simply a normal part of the workflow, and should allow a nervous client to check every day if they felt it helped. A good solicitor should welcome a system like that, but I can see how a poor solicitor would rather not be so visible.

This.

We’re in the process of buying/selling right now and our solicitor uses a system called “eWay” - it’s blummin’ fantastic. I can see everything that’s been done already, everything that’s pending - it’s all very transparent. It sends me a text message every time I’m allocated a new task and reminds me each day how many tasks I have outstanding. We last moved house 18 years ago, and I have spent the last 18 years joking I’d never move again because I found the process so awful...this time around having the eWay portal has made my life so much easier and less stressful. 

Thrugelmir

camden_kid said:

fleur8 said:

csgohan4 said: csgohan4 said:

There's always 2 sides of the story,. how often did you chase the solicitors? x4 a week? x4 a day? 

Here’s my side of the story:

• July - contact made to instruct
• August - I did not make contact
• September - I did not make contact
• October - I did not make contact 
• Oct 26th - lots of legal documents received with an invitation for queries
• Oct 28th - I send queries 
• November 11th - I kindly double check my email with queries was received 
• November 13th - I do not ask a question but simply inform the solicitor that I have received my mortgage offer  
• November 16th - Solicitor replies and says he will reply to my queries today..but complains about how many there are and many are repeats (15 questions)
• November 18th - I ask again purely because he said ‘today’
• November 19th - Solicitor replies and says ‘soon’  
• November 23rd - I ask for clarification about what soon means with no pressure, just for my knowledge 

The above is paraphrased and summarised incl dates and phrases. I admit that I did email too many times this particular week, perhaps. But I feel that you shouldn’t introduce a timeline and not expect to be asked about it. 

What issues were outstanding? I had a 'simple' lease entry and that still took 1-2 months to clarify

Legal terminology that I just couldn’t understand. 

Another example: I asked about a specific report/survey provided by the sellers, asking the solicitor to ask the sellers for more information as urgent actions were recommended from the survey and the solicitor replied saying I DO NOT REVIEW YOUR surveys, even though it is clearly not my survey. This is just one example of when the solicitor did not read my question and therefore misunderstood what I was asking. 

Was a conveyor belt solicitor on the cheap used?
 I don’t know what that is. 
Define top firm you allegedly used, 'top solicitors' charge 300 plus an hour for their time
This solicitor is charging £4000 with £300 per hour for extra work. 
All this about I paid my money I expect a 'service' is all relative is it not? You pay the bottom range for solicitors you would get bottom level service, you pay a bit more you would hope you get a bit more service.
I did not pay for a bottom range solicitor for this exact reason. 
No harm in making a complaint to the firm, as others have mentioned you can move firms, but it  may cost and may delay things

I don’t want to make a complaint, nor do I want to change solicitor. I was hoping to find someone else to help me hence my posts but I have every intention of posting on here. 

My answers are in bold, thank you

£4000! 

How much was the solicitors fee?