Complaints Procedure

Your Rights to Make a Complaint

GOOD LAW INTERNATIONAL’s Complaints Procedure

Your feedback is very important to us. Firstly, we hope that you will have no complaint. If you have any complaint or observation (good or bad) about our service, please say so.

If we do not deliver to the high standard of service you should expect from GOOD LAW INTERNATIONAL LTD – we want to know.

How We Handle Complaints

We will always investigate your complaint and try to resolve the issue as quickly as possible.

Below are the steps that we will follow in order to try to resolve your complaint.

If you are unhappy about any aspect of the service you have received, we recommend that you first contact the fee earner handling your matter (stated in your Client Care Letter) to raise any concerns with them – including any complaint about your invoice. This is often the quickest and easiest way to resolve an issue.

When contact us with your complaint, please ensure that you provide us with the following details:

  • Your full name and contact details
  • Your matter reference number
  • What you believe has gone wrong
  • What you are seeking in terms of resolution

If this does not resolve your complaint satisfactorily, tell the Supervisor responsible for your matter (also
stated in your Client Care Letter). If you do not feel comfortable speaking with the fee earner and/or the
Supervisor handling your matter then you can contact our Complaints Director directly.

If the issue still needs to be taken further as you are not satisfied or you wish to submit a formal complaint to Good Law International Ltd, you can contact us in the following way:

Contact: Atef Elmarakby, The Managing Partner

Address: GOOD LAW INTERNATIONAL, Office 1.03 Vauxhall Sky Gardens, 153 Wandsworth Road, London, SW8 2GB.

Email: atef.elmarakby@goodlawintl.com

Phone: +442071399266

We will acknowledge your complaint in writing within seventy-two (72) working hours of receipt.

We will take details of your complaint or review the details you have provided and discuss them with you, the legal adviser dealing with the matter, and, if appropriate, their Supervisor.

We will then provide you with an initial response to your complaint, with a suggested way forward. If you accept that this resolves your complaint, this will be the end of the process, which we call a “Stage One” resolution. We would hope that most complaints are resolved prior to or at this stage.

Whenever possible, we will seek to respond, substantively, to a complaint within twenty (20) working days of receipt of the complaint.

If you are not satisfied with the initial response, your complaint will be passed to the nominated Complaints Director, Atef Elmarakby. He will review the information and, on most occasions, the case file. He will then provide you with a substantive response to the complaint. If you accept that the response resolves your complaint, that would be the end of the process, which we call a “Stage Two” resolution.

Whenever possible, we will seek to resolve a complaint within eight (8) weeks of receipt of the complaint. We will write to you setting out our final response to the complaint and how you can pursue your concerns further if you do not agree with our proposed resolution and outcome.

If you remain dissatisfied at that point, we will offer you the opportunity to resolve the complaint using Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) via:

Pro Mediate UK Limited, The Legal Complaints Service, Brow Farm, Top Road, Frodsham WA6 6SP.

Website: www.promediate.co.uk

They are competent to deal with complaints about legal services, should you and we agree to use them. If you (and we) accept their proposed resolution, that would be the end of the process, which we call a “Stage Three” resolution.

You do not have to agree to this ADR and can go straight to the Legal Ombudsman after you have received our substantive response after Stage Two. If we agree to use such a scheme we will inform you when notifying you of our final response to your complaint.

If you are not satisfied after ADR (or at the end of Stage Two if you do not agree to the ADR), you have the right to complain to the Legal Ombudsman, the details of which are given below.

The Legal Ombudsman investigates complaints about service issues with lawyers.

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.

Contact details for the Legal Ombudsman:

Address: PO Box 6806, Wolverhampton, WV1 9WJ
Phone: 0300 555 0333
Website: www.legalombudsman.org.uk

There will be no charge to you at any stage of the complaint investigation, including the appointment of the ADR firm and any involvement of the Legal Ombudsman.

If you are unhappy with our behaviour, the Solicitors Regulation Authority can help. This could be for
things like dishonesty, taking or losing money or treating you unfairly because of your age, a disability
or characteristic. Visit: the Solicitors Regulation Authority for more information.

Timescales

  • Stage One – within twenty (20) working days from receipt of a complaint
  • Stage Two – within eight (8) weeks from receipt of a complaint
  • Stage Three – within two (2) weeks from the date of ADR

The Legal Ombudsman will provide you with an estimated timescale, which may vary according to the complexity of the complaint. We have no control over their timescale, save that we will comply, so far as possible, with requests made to us for information within the periods they set.

If for a good reason we are unlikely to be able to complete any Stage within the periods mentioned above, we will inform you. If we have to change any of the timescales above, we will let you know and explain why.

If you feel we have delayed unreasonably responding to your complaint, you can complain directly to the Legal Ombudsman. However, they will normally allow law firms up to eight (8) weeks to respond to complaints.

Time Limits

n respect of any issue which arises out of work we undertook after 5 October 2010, you have one (1)
year from the date of the act or omission to inform the Legal Ombudsman of the complaint or within six
(6) months of our final response to you.

Non-Client Complaints

If you are not a client of the Firm and wish to complain about the conduct of the firm or its employees, please write to our Complaints Director (at Good Law Firm Ltd, Office 1.03, Vauxhall Sky Gardens, 153 Wandsworth Road, London, SW8 2GB) who will contact you and explain how they will deal with your complaint.

Additional Notes

This Complaints Procedure is designed to address complaints of inadequate service. If you think we
have made a mistake, we may have to report this to our professional indemnity insurers. In that event,
we are sometimes obliged to discuss the matter with them before we can respond. At that stage, you
may be advised of the need to take advice from an independent solicitor, but we will seek to put matters
right where possible.

If you make a claim against us because you believe we have made a mistake or have been negligent, this may affect your ability to complain to the Legal Ombudsman whilst the claim is running.

If your complaint is about the amount you have been charged, please note that you have the right to apply to the Court to have our invoice assessed, as set out on our invoices sent to you. This is a complex procedure about which we would suggest you seek independent advice.

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