At Wadsworths, 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 are unhappy with the level of service we have provided you or any invoice, please contact the person dealing with your case to discuss your concerns in the first instance. You may prefer to do this in writing via email or letter. We will do our best to resolve any issues at this stage.

If your primary contact is unable to resolve matters and you remain dissatisfied, please forward your written complaint to Wadsworths Director and lead Complaints Officer, Alex Tait.

We take complaints very seriously and will aim to deal with these as soon as possible.

• We will send you either a letter or email acknowledging your complaint and confirm the name of the person who will be reviewing your complaint.
• We will then start to investigate your complaint. This may involve one or more of the following steps:
  o We may ask the member of staff who acted for you to reply to your complaint within 8 weeks;
  o We may examine the reply and the information in your complaint. We may then ask for more information;
  o We will record your complaint in our central register and open a file for your complaint;
  o We may invite you to meet the fee earner in charge of the department that dealt with your case in order to discuss and hopefully resolve your complaint;
  o Within two days of the meeting, we will write to confirm what took place, and any suggestions we have agreed with you. If you do not want a meeting or it is not possible, we will send you a detailed reply to your complaint. This will include our suggestions for resolving the matter. This will happen within 7 days of us completing the investigation;
• We will endeavour to deal with your complaint in a way that best suits your needs.

  Once you have a final response from us, you may have the right to take your complaint to the Legal Ombudsman. You should raise your complaint with them within six months of our final response to you.

• one year from the date of the act or omission being complained about; or
• one year from the date when the complainant should have realised that there was cause for complaint

The contact details for the Legal Ombudsman are:
The Legal Ombudsman,
PO Box 6806,
Wolverhampton,
WV1 9WJ.

Call: 0300 555 0333 (calls are charged at local rate and will be recorded). If you are calling from overseas, please call +44 121 245 3050; for the minicom call 0300 555 1777. Email:
enquiries@legalombudsman.org.uk

Please note the Legal Ombudsman may not deal with a complaint about a bill if you have applied to the court for assessment of that bill. Further information can be obtained from their website at www.legalombudsman.org.uk

Alternative complaints bodies (Ombudsman Services, ProMediate and Small Claims mediation) exist which are competent to deal with complaints about legal services. The details of these can be found at:

www.ombudsman-services.org
www.promediate.co.uk
www.small-claims-mediation.co.uk

The Solicitors Regulation Authority can help you if you are concerned about our behaviour. This could be for concerns about dishonesty, taking or losing your money or treating you unfairly because of your age, a disability or other characteristic. You can raise your concerns directly with the Solicitors Regulation Authority (www.sra.org.uk).