Conveyancers not communicating

ohdarn

Hello everyone. We're after as little advice on how to approach our conveyancer (this might be a bit lengthy, sorry).
We're in the middle of a short chain, a landlord is buying from us and we're buying a house that has no chain above it.
We're nearly at the end of the process but we're a bit stuck on enquiries (it's worth mentioning that it's taken such a long time to get to this point).
Our conveyancer told us that they hadn't received any enquiries from our buyer yet and that they were waiting on responses to enquiries from our purchase.
But after a few phone calls it's turned out that our buyer has been trying to send enquiries for weeks and received no response and our purchase claim they've received no enquires and have been trying to get in contact with our conveyancer since December and had no luck.
We've contacted our conveyancer and they provided us with their direct email address and phone number and we've passed these on to the buyers and purchase's conveyancers.
Our conveyancer said they'd get back to us within an hour to let us know how they'd for on with trying to contact people.
That was Wednesday.
We've tried contacting everyone again, but no one is picking up the phone now.
So I'm not sure what to do next. We've been patient and polite about all the other problems we've had but the apparent apathy from everyone involved is getting to me quite alot now.
If we hadn't started nosing around a bit and asking questions then it would have been stuck in this state of non-communication forever.
We're paying them thousands of pounds for this service but it seems like they don't care.
It always seems to be us trying to sort out their problems. 
Anyhoo, has anyone got any tips for motivating conveyancers to get things moving or are we at their mercy?
Cheers

princeofpounds

Make a formal complaint (they will have a process). 

If you don't get them moving within a reasonable timeline, consider firing them and getting a better conveyancer. 

mcpitman

You are the solicitors client, so you should receive service as such.

Try ringing another number for the company (not your solicitor) and ask to be put through, if they can;t get you through ask for a manager etc.

ohdarn

Thanks for the replies.
We tried to get in contact with them again in Friday to check if enquiries had been received for the sale and sent off for the purchase but it was all "we'll ring you back" (they didn't) or just no answer.
I give up with them.

Thrugelmir

To be honest. Landlord (buyer) rings alarm bells. Are you in direct contact?  Remember this is a business transaction you aren't buddies. Is there a mortgage or is the LL buying for cash?

What's the position of the vendors? Have you asked the EA to chase them? 

You are blaming your conveyancers yet there's no indication that it's them at fault. They have no control over the other parties in the chain. 

Tiglet2

ohdarn said:

Thanks for the replies.
We tried to get in contact with them again in Friday to check if enquiries had been received for the sale and sent off for the purchase but it was all "we'll ring you back" (they didn't) or just no answer.
I give up with them.

Friday is usually the busiest day for completions, which have to take priority.  You stand a better chance of getting a response if you enquire on a Tuesday or Wednesday which are normally quieter. 

However with the pandemic, stamp duty deadline approaching, staff working from home and huge caseloads, giving you an update on whether enquiries had been received/sent off is not critical to the length of time your transaction is taking.  It would involve someone locating your sale and purchase files, possibly having to collect them from the office, reviewing them to ascertain what stage each one is at and then having to phone/email you with the update, which ultimately is not progressing your file at all, in fact delays work on other priority matters, producing a knock-on effect on all the clients they are acting for.

Are you actually paying them thousands?  There is their fee, plus disbursements which are fees paid to third parties and should not be confused with "paying them thousands".  How much are you paying your EA?

ohdarn

Thrugelmir said:

To be honest. Landlord (buyer) rings alarm bells. Are you in direct contact?  Remember this is a business transaction you aren't buddies. Is there a mortgage or is the LL buying for cash?

What's the position of the vendors? Have you asked the EA to chase them? 

You are blaming your conveyancers yet there's no indication that it's them at fault. They have no control over the other parties in the chain. 

Our estate agent is in contact with the landlord and their conveyancer.
They are taking out a BTL mortgage I believe.
I'm fairly certain that all of the conveyancers are at fault, unfortunately.
As far as I can tell, it seems that things are being sent off to (maybe) the admin side of things but then they're not being passed on to the people that need to see them.
It's a bit long winded to detail all the things that seem to have gone missing in the machine of this process, but both sides have reported trying to get in contact with our conveyancer for several weeks but without any joy.
As I mentioned we've given out our conveyancers direct email address in the hope that speeds things up but we've not had any confirmation that anything has been sent yet. 
Yes, we've been on at the estate agents on both sides but they're struggling to get ahold of any conveyancers.

ohdarn

Tiglet2,
I'm in two minds about those excuses though, on the one hand I understand these are exceptional times, on the other, if their ability to work to a decent standard is severely compromised to the point where they just aren't functioning, then they shouldn't really be taking on any more work.
I'm not sure if it's the former or the latter that I'll go with yet.
I'm pretty sure sending and receiving enquiries is integral to the house buying process, no?
If we'd left the situation as it was without chasing anyone, then we'd still be waiting to move until the heat death of the universe.
There was a breakdown of communication between the conveyancers that we're trying to sort out.
We're simply trying to find out if they have the ability to send and receive nformation from each other.
If performing the most basic of their duties takes time away from other cases, then that's their problem, I'm not asking them to do anything out of the ordinary or particularly fantastic, I just want to know that they've managed to get a message to the right people from A to B and B to C and back again.
Something none of them seem to have managed despite a month of trying.
I don't think estate agents can send each other enquiries can they?
Our estate agents have contacted our buyer as much as we've asked them to, to pass on messages and suchlike, I'm not sure what else they can do.
Oh, and they got our statement of fees massively wrong and we've been waiting for a replacement for weeks.
I think I'm erring on the side of that latter hand to be honest.

onylon

I had very similar issues with my sale and conveyancers 'losing' emails. It was mainly human error/apathy but it certainly didnt help that both solicitors firms had it issues that practically guaranteed that anything they sent would go to spam (invalid SPF records) and our buyers solicitors email server silently dropped some attachments.

I would recommend you speak to your EA as they may be able to work out what the problem is and your conveyancer may be more inclined to speak to them than to you directly. Apparently most of our blockers were removed when the EA went through the list of outstanding enquiries with our buyers solicitor and literally forwarded them all the 'missing' information while they were on the phone. Communication issues added at least 4 weeks to our sale and nearly caused it to fall through completely so I would say that good communication is absolutely critical to your timescales.

If I were doing it again I would insist on a communication schedule with my conveyancer from the start, email minutes of every call to the EA and solicitor so that there is a record of any agreements or promises made, and be much much more proactive about chasing things up. Basically pretend like I'm a project manager with a particularly difficult contractor! 

ohdarn

onylon said:

I had very similar issues with my sale and conveyancers 'losing' emails. It was mainly human error/apathy but it certainly didnt help that both solicitors firms had it issues that practically guaranteed that anything they sent would go to spam (invalid SPF records) and our buyers solicitors email server silently dropped some attachments.

I would recommend you speak to your EA as they may be able to work out what the problem is and your conveyancer may be more inclined to speak to them than to you directly. Apparently most of our blockers were removed when the EA went through the list of outstanding enquiries with our buyers solicitor and literally forwarded them all the 'missing' information while they were on the phone. Communication issues added at least 4 weeks to our sale and nearly caused it to fall through completely so I would say that good communication is absolutely critical to your timescales.

If I were doing it again I would insist on a communication schedule with my conveyancer from the start, email minutes of every call to the EA and solicitor so that there is a record of any agreements or promises made, and be much much more proactive about chasing things up. Basically pretend like I'm a project manager with a particularly difficult contractor! 

That's great advice, thank you very much for the reply.

Seashell517

onylon said

If I were doing it again I would insist on a communication schedule with my conveyancer from the start, email minutes of every call to the EA and solicitor so that there is a record of any agreements or promises made, and be much much more proactive about chasing things up. Basically pretend like I'm a project manager with a particularly difficult contractor! 

You'd better budget significantly higher for legal fees then, because you'll be charged at the hourly rate for every communication...