FAMILY LAW SOLUTIONS SOLICITORS
Complaints Handling Policy and Procedure 2024
Our Complaints Policy
We are committed to providing a high-quality legal service to all our clients.
If you are unhappy about any aspect of our service please tell us about it so that, where possible, we can address your concerns, and where a problem exists, seek to resolve it.
If you wish to raise an issue with us, whether it is a formal complaint or not, please let us know by telephone, by post, or preferably by email to gt@familylaw-solutions.co.uk
The Legal Ombudsman suggests that you should allow us eight weeks to consider any complaint https://www.legalombudsman.org.uk/for-consumers/faqs/. If we have not resolved it within this time you may complain to the Legal Ombudsman. Our full procedure is set out below along with contact details for The Legal Ombudsman.
Our Complaints Procedure
- Upon becoming aware of an issue or complaint we will :-
- Record your complaint in our register. This enables our regulator to ascertain that we are handling complaints appropriately; and
- Write to you to confirm that we will consider the matter under our complaints procedure. We will endeavour to summarise our understanding of the issue(s) to be considered. This will give you an opportunity to correct any errors in our understanding, and ensure that we consider the correct issues. We would usually expect to write to you within a week of becoming aware of issues requiring investigation. Please let us know as soon as possible following receipt of our letter whether we have correctly understood the nature of your complaint.
- Having clarified the nature of your complaint, we will investigate the matter. In the course of investigation we may need to speak with you or write to you for further information. Having gathered all of the relevant information we will write to you, explaining the firm’s position, with a view to resolving the complaint. This may involve an acceptance that the firm has been at fault, and may be coupled with an apology or an offer to resolve the complaint in other ways. If we do not consider the firm to be at fault we will explain why. We may additionally speak to you, by telephone or in person, where appropriate to explain the outcome of our investigation and any proposed options for resolving it.
- If you are dissatisfied with our response, please do let us know. In appropriate cases, we may, with your consent, invite an external law firm to review the matter. We may exceptionally, agree to mediate the issue through an alternative complaints body, such as ProMediate (www.promediate.co.uk). We will only agree to mediate through such an independent body if we consider the complaint capable of being resolved through mediation. For example, if there is a factual dispute between us, a mediator is unlikely to be able to help.
- Ultimately, if we are unable to resolve your complaint, you may make a complaint to the Legal Ombudsman. Information regarding their complaint handling process can be accessed here https://www.legalombudsman.org.uk/for-consumers/. Their contact details are :
- Email : enquiries@legalombudsman.org.uk
- Telephone : 0300 555 0333
- Postal address : Legal Ombudsman, PO Box 6167, Slough, SL1 0EH
5. Before accepting a complaint for investigation, The Legal Ombudsman will check that you are eligible to bring a complaint, and have tried to resolve your complaint with us first. Normally, you will need to bring a complaint to LeO within six months of our final written response, and in any event, within one year from the date of the act or omission being complained about; or when you should have realised that there was cause for complaint. The Legal Ombudsman has the discretion to accept out-of-time complaints in circumstances where it deems it “fair and reasonable to do so”.
While it is rare for issues to arise in the delivery of our services, we hope that where you are concerned, you feel able to speak openly with us, and that we can resolve the problem to your satisfaction.
Geeta Tiwana,
Family Law Solutions Solicitors Ltd