Our Complaints Procedure

Slater Heelis is committed to providing a high quality legal service to all our clients. If you have any reason to be unhappy with the service provided by our firm or about our bill, the following procedure is in place to assist you.

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Slater Heelis is committed to providing a high-quality legal service to all our clients. However, from time to time we may fall short of our own expected standards. On these rare occasions, it is important for you to have the opportunity to voice any dissatisfaction so that we can address the issues and improve our standards. We will deal with any such complaints fairly, sympathetically and quickly.

If you have any reason to be unhappy with the service provided by our firm or about our bill, the following procedure is in place to assist you.

1. The first step is that you should always speak to or write to the person handling your matter and explain the cause of your dissatisfaction. The vast majority of problems can usually be resolved at this stage on an amicable basis.

2. If the situation has not been resolved to your satisfaction the next more formal approach is to raise the issue with our Head of Regulation and Compliance who is Jill Entwistle. She can be contacted on 0161 672 1331, by e-mail at [email protected] or by writing to her at:

1st Floor,
Crossgate House,
47-55 Cross Street,
Sale,
M33 7FT

If at all possible, please put your complaint in writing, explaining the circumstances and the reasons for your dissatisfaction. We will endeavour to acknowledge it within 2 working days.

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.

We are obliged to point out to you that there are alternative complaints bodies, such as ProMediate (www.ProMediate.co.uk), who can deal with complaints about legal services where all the parties agree to use such a scheme.  We do not agree to use ProMediate. In the United Kingdom, we believe that the Legal Ombudsman’s scheme is the most suitable for legal complaints.

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 done this and we have not been able to resolve it within eight weeks then you must take your complaint to the Legal Ombudsman:

This is within six months of receiving a final response to your complaint, and:

  • No more than one year from the date of act/omission; or
  • No more than one year from when you should reasonably have known there was cause for complaint.

The Legal Ombudsman will normally only consider a complaint from you if we have failed to resolve the matter to your satisfaction. It is, therefore, important that our complaints handling procedure is carried out in full before you use that avenue to attempt to resolve the matter. The Legal Ombudsman service is free of charge.

If you would like more information about the Legal Ombudsman, please contact them:

Visit: www.legalombudsman.org.uk

Call: 0300 555 0333 between 9am to 5pm.

Email: [email protected]

Legal Ombudsman
PO Box 6167
Slough
SL1 0EH

Please note that if your complaint relates to our fees, you may also apply to the Court for an assessment of the bill under Part III of the Solicitors Act 1974 although the Legal Ombudsman may not deal with your complaint if you have already applied for an assessment.

We are regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority. If we are unable to resolve your complaint satisfactorily as described in points 1-5 above you may feel that the SRA would be the best place to continue to pursue your complaint rather than the Legal Ombudsman. Guidance on the types of complaints which ought to be brought to the SRA’s attention can be found on their website at https://www.sra.org.uk/consumers/problems/.

Additional guidance on bringing your complaint to the attention of the SRA and the online form is provided at https://www.sra.org.uk/consumers/problems/report-solicitor/.
We will always endeavour to deal with your complaint within the timescales outlined but if it is not possible to do so, we will let you know and explain the reasons.

If you have any questions about this procedure and your rights under it, please do not hesitate to contact the Head of Regulation and Compliance, Jill Entwistle. We hope that the need to use this procedure will not arise but if it does, please be assured that your matter will be dealt with objectively, quickly and with the utmost courtesy. There is no cost to you for us to deal with a complaint under this procedure.

We will not charge you for handling your complaint.

Please note that if we have issued a bill for work done on the matter, and all or some of the bill is not paid, we may be entitled to charge interest on the amount outstanding.