It is our policy to act as efficiently and expeditiously as possible always providing a high quality of service and continuously improving our standards. This document explains the procedure we will follow in order to handle any client complaints we receive in an efficient, competent and professional manner, in line with our terms of business, which apply to this procedure.
In the first instance, it may be helpful to contact the person who is working on your case to discuss your concerns, and we will do our best to resolve any issues. If at any time you are concerned about the service or the cost of the service you are receiving, please immediately inform the Partner with overall responsibility for your case in order to attempt to resolve any of your concerns. Making a complaint will not affect how we handle your case.
In the unlikely that you are not satisfied with their proposal for resolution of your concern, please contact either our Compliance Officer, Konstantin Rzhebaev or Managing Director, David Manasyan, in writing or by telephone on our office number.
You can expect to receive a response to any written communication, within 3 working days, acknowledging your complaint and request any further information, where necessary. We will confirm when we should be in a position to provide a substantive response. In any event, we will aim to conclude our investigations within eight weeks of your complaint being made. However, in exceptional circumstances, we may need more time, if so, we will inform you accordingly.
What to do if we cannot resolve your complaint
The Legal Ombudsman can help you if we are unable to resolve your complaint ourselves. They will look at your complaint independently, and it will not affect how we handle your case.
Before accepting a complaint for investigation, the Legal Ombudsman will check that you have tried to resolve your complaint with us first. If you have, then you must take your complaint to the Legal Ombudsman:
- Within six months of receiving our final response to your complaint
and
- No more than one year from the date of the act or omission being complained about; or
- No more than one year from the date when you should reasonably have known that there was cause for complaint.
For more information contact the Legal Ombudsman.
What to do if you are unhappy with our behaviour
In the highly unlikely event that you need to make a complaint, and your complaint is not about our service but is about our conduct, the SRA (Solicitors Regulation Authority) deals with conduct issues rather than the Legal Ombudsman, which deals with service issues. The Solicitors Regulation Authority can help if you are concerned about our behaviour. This could be for things like dishonesty, taking or losing your money or treating you unfairly because of your age, a disability or other characteristics.
Visit their website to see how you can raise your concerns with the Solicitors Regulation Authority.
Alternative complaint bodies (such as ProMediate at http://www.promediate.co.uk) exist, which are competent to deal with complaints about legal services should both you and our firm wish to use such a scheme.