Complaints Policy

Teelan & Silwal Family Law Limited Complaints Procedure

We hope that you will never have cause to complain about our services but, if you are dissatisfied with your relationship with us, or the way in which any aspect of your work is being or has been handled, you should contact the Director with overall responsibility for your matter in the first instance. Making a complaint will not affect how we handle your matter for so long as we remain acting for you.

The firm’s complaints manager is Catherine Silwal, the Compliance Officer.  In her absence, or if the complaint is about her, a Director may act in her place.

The firm will endeavour to make reasonable adjustments for complainants who require assistance because of disability, vulnerability, language requirements or other individual circumstances.

Complaints may be made in writing, by email, by telephone or by any other reasonable method requested by you.

Our complaints procedure

If your concern cannot be resolved by the Director with overall responsibility for your matter, then you should contact the other Director at the firm being either:

• Director at the Firm Rosalyn O’Donnell-Teelan, by email (rodt@tandsfamilylaw.com) or post (2 Stephen Street, London, W1T 1AN) or phone (+44(0) 20 3036 0978).

• Director at the Firm Catherine Silwal, by email (cs@tandsfamilylaw.com) or post (2 Stephen Street, London, W1T 1AN) or phone (+44(0) 20 3036 0978).

We reserve the right to respond to any complaint against us either through the individual with overall responsibility for your matter or through the alternative Director listed above.

What will happen next?

1. We will send you a letter acknowledging your complaint and asking you to confirm or explain any details. We will also let you know the name of the person who will be dealing with your complaint.
2. We will then record your complaint in our central register and open a file for your complaint. We will also investigate your complaint by examining your matter file.
3. If appropriate, we will then invite you to meet with or speak with a Director to discuss and hopefully resolve your complaint. We would hope to be in a position to meet or speak with you in this way no longer than 14 days after first receiving your complaint. If you would prefer not to meet, or if we cannot arrange this within an agreeable timescale, the Director will write to you setting out her views on the situation and any redress that we would feel to be appropriate.
4. Within two days of any meeting, we will write to you to confirm what took place and any suggestions that we have agreed with you. In appropriate cases we could offer an apology, a reduction of any bill or a repayment in relation to any payment received.  This may also be the case if we do not have a call or meeting and if we are able to deal with matters in correspondence.
5. At this stage, if you are still not satisfied, please let us know. We will then arrange to review our decision. We would generally aim to do this within 10 days. This will happen in one of the following ways:
   • The complaint will be reviewed by a Director or other suitably senior person who has not been directly involved in the matter or the complaint wherever possible.
   • We will invite you to agree to independent mediation. We will let you know how long this process will take.
6. We will let you know the result of the review within five days of its end. At this time, we will write to you confirming our final position on your complaint and explaining our reasons. We will also give you the name and address of the Legal Ombudsman (also set out below) if you are still not satisfied, so that you can contact them regarding your complaint. We very much hope that this will not be necessary.

You can raise your concerns with the Solicitors Regulation Authority if you are concerned about our behaviour. This could be for suspicions of dishonesty, taking or losing your money or treating you unfairly because of your age, a disability or other characteristic, although we are confident that you will never need to raise such an issue.

What to do if we cannot resolve your complaint

If you are dissatisfied with our response, or eight weeks have passed since you made your complaint and the matter has not been resolved, you may then take your complaint to the Legal Ombudsman. They will look at your complaint independently and it will not affect how we handle your case for so long as we remain acting for you.

Before accepting a complaint for investigation, the Legal Ombudsman will check that you have tried to resolve your complaint with us first. The complaint must usually be referred to the Legal Ombudsman within six months of our final written response and no later than one year from the act or omission complained about, or one year from when the complainant should reasonably have known there was cause for complaint.

There may be some exceptions to these time frames.  If you would like more information about the Legal Ombudsman, please contact them using the details below.

Contact details for Legal Ombudsman

Visit: www.legalombudsman.org.uk
Call: 0300 555 0333 between 9am to 5pm
Email: enquiries@legalombudsman.org.uk
Legal Ombudsman, PO Box 6167, Slough SL1 0EH