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Customer Feedback & Complaints

At Hodge Jones & Allen we are committed to continuous improvement. We hope that you will never have reason to complain about our services or our bill, however, our legal teams are dedicated to providing a first class service to all our clients and should something go wrong we need you to tell us about it.

Our Complaints Policy

We hope that you will initially be able to resolve any problem or complaint that you have with your lawyer on an informal basis. However, if this is not possible, we will apply the following procedure.

Our Complaints Procedure

If you have a complaint that you have not been able to resolve informally with your lawyer, please contact Bree Knight, our Complaints Coordinator.

Email: bknight@hja.net

Your complaint should be lodged 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, please also note the time limits set by the Legal Ombudsman, at the end of this document.

Ms Knight will pass your complaint to the partner in charge of the department involved in your complaint or another partner if appropriate. Chun Wong, Client Relations Partner will also oversee the matter.

What Will Happen Next?

  1. We will send you a letter acknowledging your complaint and we may ask you to confirm or explain the details set out.
  2. We will record your complaint in our central register and open a file for your complaint.
  3. We will then start to investigate your complaint. This may involve one or more of the following steps.
    • The team partner will ask the member of staff who acted for you to comment on your complaint.
    • He or she will examine their response and the details of your complaint. S/he may then ask them for more information.
    • S/he will examine your case file and draft a response to your complaint. This should be done within 8 weeks of receiving your original complaint.
  4. At this stage, if you are still not satisfied you can write to us again. We will then arrange to review our decision. Mrs Wong, or, if appropriate, another partner uninvolved in the investigation so far, will review your complaint and will write to you confirming our final position on your complaint and explaining our reasons.
  5. In certain circumstances, we may proceed straight to an investigation and reply from Chun Wong.
  6. We hope to complete the different stages outlined above well within reasonable timescales. However, some complaints take longer than others to resolve.

If we are unable to resolve your complaint then you can have the complaint independently looked at by the Legal Ombudsman. The Legal Ombudsman investigates complaints about service issues with lawyers. Their contact details are:

Legal Ombudsman
Address PO Box 6167, Slough, SL1 0EH
Telephone 0300 555 0333
Email enquiries@legalombudsman.org.uk

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. You must also refer your concerns to the Legal Ombudsman within six months of our final response to you.

When to report a solicitor to the SRA
If you have complained to your solicitor about breaching the SRA Code of Conduct and you are not satisfied with their response, you can report them to the SRA.

Solicitors must follow the code of conduct. Examples of a breach include:

  • dishonesty
  • fraud
  • discrimination

Report a breach on the SRA website

Sharing your comments and feedback

If you would like to provide any other feedback regarding our lawyers or services, please e-mail contactus@hja.net

We are authorised and regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority.