Our Complaints Policy
We aim to provide you with a high-quality legal service. However, if you are concerned about that service or something goes wrong we need you to tell us about it so that we can do our best to put things right and improve our service standards.
Our complaints procedure
If you have a complaint, please set it out in writing to Mr John Wroblewski, our Complaints Director. You can write to him at Cook & Talbot Limited, Ground Floor, The Old Courthouse, 2A Albert Road, Southport PR9 0LE or by email to john.wroblewski@cookandtalbot.co.uk.
Please provide as much information as possible including your full name and contact details and an explanation about the basis of your complaint. If you have a file reference number please ensure that this is also provided.
What happens
next
Following receipt of your complaint the following timetable will ordinarily be applied. If, for any reason, we are unable to comply with that timetable, we will let you know. We always aim to deal with any complaints as quickly as possible.
Action Timescale
Acknowledge
your complaint in Within
three working days.
writing,
provide you with a
copy
of our complaints procedure
and
record your complaint in
our
central register. We will also
invite
you to clarify any issues
in
your complaint that require
explanation.
Confirm
receipt of any such Within
five working days of any
clarification
to ensure that we further
clarification that is provided.
have
all relevant details to deal
with
your complaint.
Investigate
your complaint. Within
the next ten working days.
Report
the outcome of our Within
the next fifteen working days
investigation
to you in writing. of
completing our investigation.
Conclude
our review of Within
eight weeks of your initial
your
complaint. complaint.
If you remain dissatisfied
at the end of our complaints process, you would then be at liberty to contact
the Legal Ombudsman, provided you are a) an individual; b) a business or enterprise that was a
micro-enterprise (European Union definition) when it referred the complaint to
the authorised person13; c) a charity that
had an annual income net of tax of less than £1 million when it referred the
complaint to the authorised person; d)
a club/association/organisation, the affairs of which are managed by its
members/a committee/a committee of its members, that had an annual income net
of tax of less than £1 million when it referred the complaint to the authorised
person; e) a trustee of a trust that
had an asset value of less than £1 million when it referred the complaint to
the authorised person; or f) a personal
representative or beneficiary of the estate of a person who, before they died,
had not referred the complaint to the Legal Ombudsman.
The Legal Ombudsman can investigate complaints no later than one year from the date of the problem happening or one year from when the complainant should reasonably have known there was cause for complaint. However, if we send a final written response to your complaint within eight weeks of receiving it, the time limit for you to refer the matter to the Legal Ombudsman would be six months from the date of that final response. If you would like more information about the Legal Ombudsman, their contact details are as follows:-
·
Website – www.legalombudsman.org.uk
·
Telephone – 0300 555 0333 between 10am to 4pm Monday to Friday (calls to
03 numbers will cost no more than calls to national geographic numbers starting
01 or 02) from both mobiles and landlines.
Calls are recorded and may be used for training and monitoring purposes.
·
Email – enquiries@legalombudsman.org.uk
·
Postal address – Legal Ombudsman PO Box 6167 Slough SL1 0EH
Alternative complaints resolution bodies also exist and are competent to deal with complaints about legal services, should both you and our firm wish to use such a scheme at the end of our internal complaints process. They provide Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) services. Small Claims Mediation is one such body, details of which can be found at www.small-claims-mediation.co.uk; and another is Ombudsman Services, details of which can be found at www.ombudsman-services.org. Under the provisions of the EU Directive on
Consumer Alternative
Dispute Resolution, to pursue this process you would have to be a “consumer”, namely an individual acting
for purposes which are wholly or mainly outside your trade, business,
craft or profession.
If we have to change any of the timescales above, we will let you know and explain why.
