We are committed to providing a high-quality service to our clients. This includes a commitment to putting things right when they go wrong. This policy explains how we will deal with any complaint that is referred to us. Your complaint might concern the way in which you have been dealt with, the quality of advice you have received or any invoice that you have received.

Our complaints procedure

If you have a complaint, please contact John Appleby. You can contact him by post at 72-74 Duke Street Chelmsford Essex CM1 1JY, or by e-mail at jappleby@leonardgray.co.uk. It is preferable that you do put your concerns into writing, but if you would prefer not to, or if you would find it difficult to do so, he can be contacted by phone at this office on 01245 504904.

To explain to you how long this process might take we have included our target times for each stage of the process. Where, for any reason, it is not possible to observe any of these limits we will let you know and explain why.

What will happen next?

  1. On receipt of your complaint John Appleby will send you a letter acknowledging your complaint and might invite you to a meeting to discuss your concerns. We will open a file for your complaint in our system and John Appleby will examine the file that we have on the work that we have been doing for you. We would look to acknowledge your complaint within two days of receiving it and will complete our initial examination within seven days.
  2. We might then invite you to a meeting or we will write to you to ask for further information. Alternatively we might write to you setting out our views on the situation and suggesting any redress that we would feel to be appropriate. We will aim to write to you with our views and any suggestions within seven days of completing our investigations.
  3. Where we feel that we have failed in our standards we could offer an apology, a reduction of any bill or a repayment in relation to any payment received.
  4. If, by this stage, you are still not satisfied, please let us know. It would be helpful to us if you could do so within the next 21 days but there is no obligation on you to do so. We will then arrange to review our decision. We would generally aim to do this within ten days of hearing from you. We will usually do this by asking another partner in this firm to review the file that we have on your complaint and see if they agree with our response.
  5. We will let you know the result of the review within seven days of the end of the review and will do so by writing to you to confirm our final position on your complaint and explaining our reasons.

What do to 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 a final response to your complaint; and
  • No more than six years from the date of act/omission; or
  • No more than three years from when you should reasonably have known there was cause for complaint.

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

Legal Ombudsman PO Box 6167 Slough SL1 0EH

legalombudsman.org.uk

0300 555 0333 (9 a.m. to 5 p.m.)

enquiries@legalombudsman.org.uk

The Solicitors Regulation Authority

The Solicitors Regulation Authority can help you 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 characteristic.

You can raise your concerns with the Solicitors Regulation Authority at any time.

Thank you for bringing your concerns to our attention. We will do our best to address any dissatisfaction that you have experienced in using the services of this firm. Our primary objective is to put things right.