1. Our Complaints Policy
We are committed to providing a high-quality legal service to all our clients. When something goes wrong, we need you to tell us about it. This will help us to improve our standards.
If you have a complaint, please contact us with the details. We have eight weeks to consider your complaint. If we have not resolved it within this time you may complain to the Legal Ombudsman.
2. How to Complain
If you have a concern or a complaint, please contact us as soon as you are aware of the problem so this can be addressed. Normally we would expect you to bring any complaint to our attention within twelve months. All correspondence should be sent to “The Complaints Manager”: –
By Telephone – 0121 704 3311
By email – complaints@charlesstrachan.com
By Letter – Charles Strachan Solicitors, M & P House, 3 Church Green East, Redditch, Worcestershire, B98 8BP.
3. What Will Happen Next?
- Where a complaint is received from you about the service offered by a member of the practice, they will be given the opportunity to resolve the matter informally with you.
- In the event that you remain unsatisfied with the informal resolution, you should contact us again and we will send you a letter acknowledging receipt of your complaint within three days of receiving it, enclosing a copy of this procedure.
- We will then investigate your complaint. This will normally involve passing your complaint to one of our Directors, who will review your matter file and speak to the relevant member of the practice.
- The Director will then invite you to a meeting to discuss and hopefully resolve your complaint. They will do this within 14 days of sending you the acknowledgement letter.
- Within three days of the meeting, the Director will write to you to confirm what took place and any solutions they have agreed with you.
- If you do not want a meeting or it is not possible, the Director will send you a detailed written reply to your complaint, including their suggestions for resolving the matter, within 21 days of sending you the acknowledgement letter.
4. Review of Complaint
- At this stage, if you are still not satisfied, you should contact us again to explain why you remain unhappy with our response and we will review your comments. Depending on the matter, we may at this stage arrange for the Managing Director to review the decision.
- We will write to you within 14 days of receiving your request for a review, confirming our final position on your complaint and explaining our reasons.
5, Appeal
- If you are still not satisfied, you can then contact the Legal Ombudsman about your complaint at;
Legal Ombudsman
PO Box 6167
Slough
SL1 0EH
You will need to bring a complaint to the Legal Ombudsman (www.legalombudsman.org.uk) within six months of receiving a final written response from us about your complaint
The Legal Ombudsman expects complaints to be made to them within one year of the date of the act or omission about which you are concerned, or within one year of you realising there was a concern. For further information, you should contact the Legal Ombudsman on 0300 555 0333 or via their website on www.legalombudsman.org.uk
- If your complaint is regarding dishonesty or a breach of the SRA Principles, then you can contact the SRA. For further information about making a complaint to the SRA and their contact details please use the following link https://www.sra.org.uk/consumers/problems/report-solicitor/
6. Other Information
- If we have to change any of the timescales above, we will let you know and explain why.
- The success of any Complaints Procedure will, in many ways, be driven by the responses from you. If no response is received, it makes it more difficult for us to evaluate the success or otherwise of our procedure. Your views are very much welcome.