CLIENT COMPLAINTS POLICY
We are committed to providing a high-quality legal service to all our clients.
We would first like to resolve any concerns you might have informally. In doing so, we aim to avoid stress and inconvenience for you and avoid lengthy investigation times that can unfortunately arise from a formal investigation. Where we try to resolve things informally, we are still aiming for the same outcome as a formal complaint: we want to fully resolve your concerns.
We will deal with all complaints promptly, fairly and free of charge.
How to make a formal complaint
If your concerns cannot be resolved informally, or you would prefer to raise a formal complaint in the first instance, you can do so by emailing or by making your complaint verbally or in writing. You may contact us by telephone, email or letter. Where a complaint is made verbally, we will make a written record of your complaint and confirm our understanding of it with you.
You may email law@mears-hobbs.co.uk or write to:
Mears Hobbs LLP Solicitors
92 High Street
Gorleston-On-Sea
Norfolk
NR31 6RH
We ask that you be clear and concise and explain what you would like us to do to put things right. We may ask you for further information where it helps us understand or investigate your complaint.
Where appropriate, we may seek to resolve straightforward service issues informally without the need to invoke the formal complaints procedure.
What will happen next?
We will acknowledge receipt of your complaint within 2 working days of receiving it. Our acknowledgement will confirm our understanding of your complaint, explain the next steps in our complaints process and provide an estimated timescale for our investigation.
We will then investigate your complaint. This will normally involve a senior member of staff reviewing your complaint, reviewing your file, speaking to members of staff who acted for you and discussing all of the above with our principle principal solicitor.
Wherever practicable, your complaint will be investigated by someone who has not been directly involved in the matter giving rise to the complaint.
Our principle principal solicitor may invite you to a meeting (which may be held remotely) if this would assist in understanding your complaint or resolving the matter. You may also request a meeting by emailing us.
If necessary, this meeting will take place within 14 days of sending you the acknowledgement letter. Within 5 working days of the meeting, we will write to you confirming what was discussed and any solutions agreed.
If our principle principal solicitor considers that a meeting is unnecessary, or you do not wish to have one, we will send you a detailed written reply to your complaint (our Final Response) including any proposals for resolving the matter. This will normally be issued within 28 days of receiving your complaint.
If we need to change any of these timescales, we will let you know and explain why.
Where appropriate, the outcome of our investigation may include:
-an explanation of what happened;
-an apology;
-putting matters right where possible;
-a reduction or refund of fees;
-appropriate compensation where justified; or
-changes to our procedures to help prevent similar issues arising in future.
What if am not satisfied with the outcome?
If we are unable to resolve your complaint within eight weeks of receiving it, or after you have received our Final Response, you may refer your complaint to the Legal Ombudsman.
The Legal Ombudsman will normally expect complaints to be referred:
within one year of the act or omission complained about; or
within one year of the date on which you should reasonably have known there was cause for complaint;
and
within six months of receiving our Final Response.
The contact details for the Legal Ombudsman are:
Website: www.legalombudsman.org.uk
Email: enquiries@legalombudsman.org.uk
Post: Legal Ombudsman, PO Box 6806, Wolverhampton, WV1 9WJ
Minicom: 0300 555 1777
Telephone: 0300 555 0333
What to do if you are unhappy with our behaviour
The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) can help if you are concerned about our conduct. This may include concerns relating to dishonesty, misuse of client money, discrimination, conflicts of interest or other serious breaches of the SRA Standards and Regulations.
Visit https://www.sra.org.uk/consumers/ for further information about raising a concern.
Complaint Monitoring
We maintain a register of complaints and periodically review complaints received to identify trends, improve the quality of our service and enhance our procedures.
Persistent or Unreasonable Complaints
If we have fully investigated your complaint, responded to all issues raised and provided our Final Response, we may decide not to enter into further correspondence unless significant new information or evidence becomes available. This will not affect your right to refer your complaint to the Legal Ombudsman where applicable.