The quality of how complaints against solicitors are handled is still not up to scratch, though the speed is getting better, writes Zahida Manzoor


The Legal Services Complaints Commissioner's aim is to encourage and influence the Law Society's Legal Complaints Service (LCS) and Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) to improve how they handle complaints against solicitors in England and Wales. The LCS and SRA submitted an improvement plan to the commissioner, setting out the work they would do to improve their complaints-handling for the period 1 April 2006 to 31 March 2007.



The commissioner set the LCS and SRA a number of targets, which she required to be included in this plan; nine of these covered the areas of quality and timeliness, which are key to improving the service being received by the consumer and the profession. When agreeing the plan for 2006/07, she had to encourage the LCS and SRA to aim higher in terms of the targets, and their performance shows they exceeded the levels they would have set themselves, and in some of the target areas, long before the end of the plan year. This highlights the importance of having someone independent of the Law Society with appropriate powers and sanctions to encourage it to stretch itself to improve its service to consumers.



Every year, the commissioner makes two decisions relating to the LCS and SRA improvement plan. The first is whether the plan submitted to her is adequate. The second relates to how the LCS and SRA have handled complaints in accordance with that plan. The commissioner can, if appropriate to do so, levy a penalty in either of these situations. The final performance information against the plan for the period 1 April 2006 to 31 March 2007 is now available. The commissioner, therefore, has a decision to make regarding whether the LCS and SRA have handled complaints in accordance with the plan.



This week, the commissioner wrote to the LCS and SRA, notifying them that they had missed a number of the targets she had set for 2006/07; this is the second year running that targets have been missed.



The commissioner's provisional decision is that the LCS and SRA have not handled complaints in accordance with the plan submitted to her. This is based on a number of factors, such as the effort made to achieve the targets and the number of targets missed. For example, four out of the nine timeliness and quality targets have been missed, the majority of which were quality targets. A decision is pending on one of the timeliness targets.



In letting the LCS and SRA know her provisional view, the commissioner stated: 'In general, there has been mixed performance against the plan this year. I welcome the improvements in timeliness, and the effort that has gone into achieving this, which is good news for the consumer.



'However, any improvements in timeliness have to be viewed within the context of a poor performance in some of the quality areas... I consider that the quality of complaints-handling is key to the effective handling of complaints, and it concerns me that complaints are not being handled in line with the Law Society's own processes. It is important that quality accompanies timeliness, and this failing impacts on the service being provided to the consumer and the profession.'



The commissioner is concerned about the LCS and SRA's performance against the quality targets, particularly as these are based on their own service standards and are largely procedural in nature. Current performance levels on the quality targets have restricted the possibility of setting more ambitious measures, focused on achieving consistent decision-making for each complaint handled, in the plan year for 2007/08.



In taking this decision, the commissioner has provided the LCS and SRA with an opportunity to provide representation to her, before giving her final decision. A date has been set for any formal representation of 5 July 2007.

Zahida Manzoor is the Legal Services Complaints Commissioner