Crap solicitor can I change?

Boardiegirl

So we are in a short chain of 5 but our solicitor is so slow!! For example it took her 5 weeks to respond to our buyers’ solicitors queries even though we responded to them the same day.
can I change solicitors within the same firm without incurring extra cost?

elsien

Have you asked the firm that question?
We have no idea of the t&c you signed up to. 

gagahouse

Short answer is no. I had to do this with my terrible first solicitor and it cost me the £150 I paid on account. I asked for a final statement so I could settle the bill if the charge was above what I'd already paid but never heard from then since!
Second solicitor costs twice as much as the first one but has been 10 times better in terms of responsiveness and speed. Lesson : you get what you pay for.

GDB2222

You should complain to the firm and ask them to resolve the issue. One solution might be to assign you to a different person within the firm. 

Ultimately, if their service is dreadful, you may need to find another firm, and you would then probably end up in a dispute over fees.  I personally would concentrate on getting the property sold and worry about the fees later.

Tiglet2

Boardiegirl said:

So we are in a short chain of 5 but our solicitor is so slow!! For example it took her 5 weeks to respond to our buyers’ solicitors queries even though we responded to them the same day.
can I change solicitors within the same firm without incurring extra cost?

Some of the buyers' solicitors queries would have been sent to other third parties, such as Land Registry, the Council, the Management Company/Freeholder as well as the buyer to respond to.  Solicitors don't tend to respond to enquiries as soon as the quickest party respond, but wait until all parties respond before sending the responses back to the buyers' solicitor.

You can request another solicitor within the same firm, but perhaps consider that if your current solicitor feels that you are too impatient or demanding, then another solicitor within the firm may not wish to act for you, since they may consider that the relationship between client/firm has broken down.

user1977

You don't have some sort of right to dictate which individuals do (or don't) deal with your work within the firm, if that's what you mean, but in practice I expect they would be happier to shift you to somebody else rather than lose your business or have a more involved complaint from you later.

Of course the problem may be that the entire department is swamped with work, so not sure why you're convinced it's the individual to blame.

Boardiegirl

Of course the problem may be that the entire department is swamped with work, so not sure why you're convinced it's the individual to blame.

The one individual in that firm is dealing with us so if she didn’t have the capacity to do the work she should have declined my money imo.

teachfast

You're wasting your time with this. They are arrogant and fail to see any issue from a client's point of view. Changing is unlikely to help. Most are simply unprofessional and rude. There is the odd gem but they are few and far between. It's an issue with a low threshold for joining the 'profession', multiple non-academic routes in and a lack of accountability once they get there.