Complaints Procedure

2. You can complain under our Complaints Procedure if you believe you have received inadequate service from a barrister who is a member of Old Square Chambers or one of its members of staff. Generally speaking, you can complain if you believe the service that you have received as a client of a barrister at Old Square Chambers or from one of its members of staff has fallen below an acceptable standard.

3. Examples of inadequate service might be a failure by a barrister to deal with all the points upon which written advice was sought or a failure to complete a piece of work within an agreed time period.

4. We will not determine complaints which essentially involve a complaint that the client, without more, disagrees with the barrister’s legal judgement on the law or facts of the case or the barrister’s professional judgement about how a case should be presented to court. This is because to do so would require the investigator to put their legal judgement above the barrister’s and would amount to the provision of a “second opinion”. This does not prevent you from pursuing the matter with the Legal Ombudsman and we provide details below about how this can be done.

5. It should be noted that it may not always be possible to investigate a complaint brought by a non-client – for example, where a barrister who is a member of Old Square Chambers has appeared on the opposing side to you and you wish to make a complaint about them. This is because our ability to investigate and resolve such matters is limited and complaints of this nature are often better suited to the disciplinary processes maintained by the Bar Standards Board.

6. In order to decide if your complaint falls within the Complaints Procedure, we will make an initial assessment of your complaint as soon as possible, and within seven days of acknowledging your complaint. If we decide that your complaint falls outside the Complaints Procedure we will refer you to the Bar Standards Board. We set out below how you can make you complaint to them.

7. You may wish to make a complaint in writing and, if so, please follow the procedure outlined We strongly recommend that you use this method. However, if you would rather speak on the telephone about your complaint and it is about a barrister who is a member of Chambers or a member of the clerking team, then in the first instance please telephone William Meade (Senior Clerk).

8. If the complaint is about the Senior Clerk, then please telephone the Chambers Director, Sarah Earl. A telephone complaint about a member of the Administration staff should also be directed to Sarah Earl.

If the complaint is about the Chambers Director, please direct the complaint to William Meade.

9. The person you contact will make a note of the details of your complaint and what you would like to have done about it. They will discuss your concerns with you and aim to resolve them. If the matter is resolved they will record the outcome, check that you are satisfied with the outcome and record that you are satisfied. You may also wish to record the outcome of the telephone discussion in writing. Please note that if your complaint is identified as being multi-faceted or complex, they may request that you supply us with the information in writing. This will not prevent an informal resolution being sought, or achieved; it is important however that the full details of your concerns are captured effectively and concisely.

For ease of reference, our telephone number is 0207 269 0300.

10. Please give the following details when contacting us regarding your complaint:

• Your name and address;
• Which member(s) of chambers you are complaining about;
• The detail of the complaint; and
• What you would like done about it

11. We would ask that you ensure all matters that you wish us to consider are included in one written communication.

12. Please address your letter to Sarah Earl, Chambers Director, (searl@oldsquare.co.uk) or Old Square Chambers, 10-11 Bedford Row, London WC1R 4BU). We will, where possible, acknowledge receipt of your complaint within five working days.

13. Once acknowledged, your complaint will be assessed within seven days by our Complaints Committee, which is a panel made up of experienced barristers and a senior member of staff.

14. If the complaint is assessed as not being a matter that falls within the remit of our Complaints Procedure, we will write to you as soon as possible, no later than seven days after our acknowledgment, setting out details as to why this has been assessed as the outcome and what further steps may be available to you.

15. If the complaint is assessed as falling within the remit of our Complaints Procedure, within twenty one days of your initial communication being received the Committee will appoint a member of Chambers to investigate it. The person appointed will be someone other than the person you are complaining about, of appropriate seniority and will be sufficiently trained. In the event that it is deemed appropriate to do so by the Complaints Committee, the Chambers Director may be asked to undertake the investigation.

16. The person appointed to investigate the complaint will write to you as soon as possible to let you know they have been appointed and that they will be investigating your complaint. They will advise you as to whether they require any further information from you at that time. If they require further information from you they will contact you to make arrangements for this. They may choose to communicate with you via our Chambers Director, as long as they are not the subject of the complaint.

17. The person investigating your complaint will prepare a written report. The report will be reviewed by the Complaints Committee. The Committee will make any recommendations they believe to be appropriate and they will write to you and include a copy of the report with their communication. This response will be sent to you within twenty one days of the investigator being appointed. The report will set out:

• The nature and scope of the investigation;
• The conclusion on each complaint and the basis for the conclusion;
• If the complaint is found to be justified, the proposals for resolving the complaint.

18. If for any reason the Committee are not able to reply within the twenty one day deadline outlined, they will write to you to set a new date for their reply, together with the reason for the extension of time.

19. The communication of the Committee’s decision to you concludes our complaints process. We set out below what further steps may be open to you in the event that you are not satisfied with the outcome of the investigation into your complaint.

20. If at any stage during the complaints process you require reasonable adjustments to the process, please ensure you communicate these clearly. Should you wish to discuss this further, or if you require this procedure in any other format or language, please contact our Chambers Director (Sarah Earl).

21. Reasonable adjustments may include, for instance, the option to outline your complaint by telephone during a fact finding call or to provide an audio recording of your complaint.

22. If you are a client of a barrister at Old Square Chambers, you are unhappy with the outcome of our investigation and you fall within their jurisdiction, you may take up your complaint with the Legal Ombudsman. They are the independent complaints body for complaints about lawyers and you can contact them at the conclusion of our consideration of your complaint.

23. The Ombudsman will only deal with complaints from consumers. This means that only complaints from the barrister’s client are within their jurisdiction. Non-clients who are not satisfied with the outcome of Chambers’ investigation, where we have been able to conduct an investigation, should contact the Bar Standards Board rather than the Legal Ombudsman.

24. The Ombudsman is not able to consider your complaint until it has first been investigated by us. Details of those clients who are able to complain to the Legal Ombudsman if they are not satisfied with the outcome of our investigation are set out on their website.

25. Please note that the Legal Ombudsman has time limits in which a complaint must be raised with them.

26. The time limits are:

• No longer than one year from the date of the act or omission being complained about, or
• No longer than one year from the date when the complainant should reasonably have known there was cause for complaint;
• Within six months of the complainant receiving a final response from their barrister or Old Square Chambers (on behalf of their barrister), if that response complies with the requirements in rule 4.4 of the Scheme Rules (which requires the response to include prominently an explanation that the Legal Ombudsman was available if the complainant remained dissatisfied, the provision of full contact details for the Ombudsman and a warning that the complaint must be referred to them within six months).

27. We must have regard to this timeframe when deciding whether we are able to investigate your complaint. Therefore, we will not usually deal with complaints that fall outside of the Legal Ombudsman’s time limits. The Ombudsman can extend the time limit in exceptional circumstances.

28. You can write to the Legal Ombudsman at:

Legal Ombudsman PO Box 6806, Wolverhampton WV1 9WJ

Telephone number: 0300 555 0333
Email: enquiries@legalombudsman.org.uk
More information about the Legal Ombudsman is available on their website:  http://www.legalombudsman.org.uk/

29. If it is the case that:

• you are not the barrister’s client and are unhappy with the outcome of our investigation, or
• our initial assessment of your complaint has concluded that we are unable to investigate your complaint because you are not the barrister’s client or your complaint does not relate to the service you have received

you can contact the Bar Standards Board (the regulatory body for barristers who practise in England and Wales) at:

Bar Standards Board
Contact and Assessment Team
289-293 High Holborn
London WC1V 7JZ

Telephone number: 020 7611 1444
Website: www.barstandardsboard.org.uk

30. If you are unhappy with the outcome of the investigation, alternative complaints bodies who are approved by the Chartered Trading Standards Institute also exist which are competent to deal with complaints about legal services, should you and the barrister both wish to use such a scheme. ProMediate are one of the organisations that can provide this service. If you wish to use this service, or if you wish to select an alternative ADR provider who service this sector, please contact us to discuss this, including time limits for contacting your chosen ADR.

31. Please also note that: (1) the time limit for contacting ProMediate is one month after our final conclusion is sent to you and (2) if ADR is used, neither you nor the barrister or member of staff is required to accept the proposed resolution.

32. If ADR does not resolve the complaint, you may still make a complaint to the Legal Ombudsman (provided you fall within their jurisdiction and you do so within the time limit which has been set out above).

33. All conversations and documents relating to the complaint will be treated as confidential and will be disclosed only to the extent that is necessary. Disclosure will be to anyone involved in the complaint and its investigation. Such people will include the barrister or member of staff who you have complained about, the Complaints Committee and the person who investigates the complaint. In the event of internal action as a result of a complaint investigation, the information may be shared with Head of Chambers or members of our Board of Management as appropriate. The Bar Standards Board is entitled to inspect the documents and seek information about the complaint when discharging its monitoring functions.

As part of our commitment to client care we make a written record of any complaint and retain all documents and correspondence generated by the complaint for a period of six years. Our Board of Management inspects an anonymised record at appropriate intervals with a view to improving services.

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