Complaints or concerns

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 of service.

What happens if you are dissatisfied with the service you have received?

If you are not happy with the service you have received, either from our UK or Gibraltar office, please raise this first with the member of staff concerned or, if you do not feel able to discuss this with him or her, the person responsible for overall supervision of the work. If you are a client (or their representative), he or she will have been named in the engagement letter we sent you at the outset of the work.

If you do not feel able to speak to either of them, or you are not satisfied with their response, you should contact our Risk & Compliance Team, setting out full details of your concerns, or the issues you have.

AZJ Legal, Risk & Compliance,
Pantiles Chambers
85 High Street
Tunbridge Wells
Kent, TN1 1XP

tel: +44 (0) 1892 506991
email: compliance@azj-legal.com

Internal Investigation

They will arrange for your complaint to be investigated in accordance with the procedure set out below.

• • within two working days of contacting us, you will be sent an acknowledgement, which will tell you who will be investigating your complaint. The person investigating your complaint will not be someone who has been involved in the matter.
  • we will fully investigate your complaint and will aim to conclude our investigation, within 28 days of our acknowledgement or the date by which we have agreed with you the issues of concern if clarification is needed.
  • our investigation will include a review of your file in relation to the issues you have complained about and we may, if we think it appropriate, invite you to a meeting to discuss your concerns. At the end of our investigation, we will send you a detailed reply confirming the outcome of our investigation into your complaint.
  • if we are unable to conclude our investigation within 28 days, we will contact you to explain why and give you a revised date by which we hope to provide our substantive response.

Who Can Complain?

Most complaints are likely to come from clients. However, beneficiaries, third parties, other professionals and suppliers, may also complain to us, if they have received, been offered or been refused the benefit of a service.

Will I Be Charged?

You will not be charged for the investigation of your complaint.

What Resolution Can I Expect?

If we find evidence of poor service, we will seek to provide an appropriate remedy. This might include:

• • an apology;
  • compensation for loss suffered;
  • compensation for inconvenience, distress or both;
  • putting things right;
  • reducing the bill or limiting fees.

If we find that there has been no poor service, we will fully explain why we have come to this conclusion.

If you are not satisfied with our handling of your complaint, you can ask the Legal Ombudsman to investigate.

Legal Ombudsman – for matters relating to the service provided by our UK office

Consumers and smaller organisations may be entitled to complain to the Legal Ombudsman about our service if they remain dissatisfied. The Ombudsman would generally expect clients to follow a firm’s internal complaints procedure first. Complaints to the Ombudsman should normally be made within six months of receiving our final response to your complaint and no more than one year from the date of when the problem first arose (or if you were not initially aware of the problem, within one year of when you should reasonably have known that there was cause for complaint).

You can find further information about the Ombudsman on their website. You can write to the Ombudsman at:

Legal Ombudsman,
PO Box 6806,
Wolverhampton,
WV1 9WJ

or by email
enquiries@legalombudsman.org.uk 
or call +44 (0)300 555 0333.

Alternative complaints bodies such as ProMediate exist which are competent to deal with complaints about legal services should both you and our firm wish to use such a scheme.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority can also 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. 

Legal Ombudsman – for matters relating to the service provided by our Gibraltar office

Gibraltar does not have a legal ombudsman. However, you can raise any concerns you have above our service or behaviour directly to the Gibraltar Legal Services Regulatory Authority:

Legal Services Regulatory Authority
Suite 841 Europort
Gibraltar
GX11 1AA

tel: +350 222 50490
info@lsra.gi