Complaints watchdog Zahida Manzoor has set out tough targets for the law society to improve its processes. Yet Grania Langdon-down hears how training solicitors to deal effectively with complaints could be the way forward

When the Legal Services Complaints Commissioner (LSCC), Zahida Manzoor, issued the Law Society with a deadline of next Monday (December 6) to produce an ‘adequate’ plan for improving its handling of complaints or face the possibility of being fined, one legal commentator asked drily: ‘Who will blink first?’


There may be little between the two sides on one key target – the Law Society says it resolves 53% of complaints within three months, while Ms Manzoor has set a provisional target of 55% for 2005/6 – but the LSCC does not mince her words.


In a press release announcing her dissatisfaction with the Society’s plan, Ms Manzoor, who is combining her role as LSCC with the separate job of Legal Services Ombudsman (LSO), said it contained ‘fundamental weaknesses’ in the information it gave on the performance targets, its initiatives to meet those targets, and the measures it intends to publish so she can track its progress.


Ms Manzoor was appointed as the LSCC in February after the Lord Chancellor, Lord Falconer, lost patience with the Law Society’s ability to handle complaints swiftly and effectively. He has praised the Society for making improvements in recent years, but has said there is still more to do.


As ombudsman, Ms Manzoor deals with individuals dissatisfied with how the Society and four other legal professional bodies have handled their complaints. But beyond producing hard-hitting reports on the Society’s complaints processes, she has no power to do more than criticise.


The LSCC is targeted solely at the Law Society, and in that guise, Ms Manzoor can levy a fine of up to £1 million or 1% of its turnover (whichever is the smaller) if the Society fails to deliver an adequate plan or in the delivery of that plan.


While Ms Manzoor stresses in her 31-page business plan that she wants her relationship with the Society to be ‘fruitful, non-confrontational and open’, her public dismissal of its initial plan must have been galling for the Society, given it is going to have to pay about £1 million a year towards the costs of her office, which it did not want set up in the first place.


However, Law Society chief executive Janet Paraskeva says it is not a case of who blinks first. Chancery Lane maintained its plan was ‘realistic and achievable’, but she stresses: ‘We are not interested in a fight. What we are interested in is a proper solution to a difficult situation. We didn’t want the appointment of the LSCC and we remain concerned about the potential conflict in her dual role. However, the LSCC is now part of the legal machinery and it is our responsibility to try to reach the targets she has set.’


And that may mean putting as much as another £2 million into the complaints-handling budget, which has already been increased from £11.3 million this year to £16.2 million in 2005. The issue will be discussed at the Law Society Council meeting later this month, and Ms Paraskeva warns that any increase will be reflected in next year’s practising certificate fee.


But, she says, while the Society may not find what the LSCC is saying easy to hear and may consider her targets harsh, ‘if this is what we have to do in order to demonstrate that we truly mean what we say about trying to offer a better service to consumers, then this is what we must do. There are people out there who have had a poor service from their solicitor and they don’t want a poor service from us as well’.


The Law Society receives about 16,000 complaints a year, which are now being dealt with by the Consumer Complaints Service, set up in April. The number of complaints-handling staff has risen from 224 in 2002 to 274 at present and should increase to 290 next year.


It only deals with service issues. Matters of misconduct are handled by the Law Society’s compliance directorate.


But, as Ms Paraskeva emphasises, one of the Society’s main roles must be to put much more work into helping solicitors avoid the sort of behaviour that causes the complaints in the first place.


She says it is interesting to compare the Society with other regulators. ‘It does sometimes feel grossly unfair that we are the organisation that is under the hammer because of history. If you look at our results compared with the bar – they close 47% of cases within three months, we close 53%. They close 66% within six months, we close 72%. But they are not in any way subjected to the same degree of criticism or scrutiny – indeed they often get praised.’


Ms Manzoor, who is ‘optimistic’ that she will reach an agreement with the Law Society, acknowledges that Chancery Lane has made inroads into the problem. But she says: ‘Bearing in mind the sums of money they say they are putting into this area, I would like to see a better performance than to date.’


She adds that her first-year targets are ‘conservative’, although she says that if the Society stops rounding down the time it takes to close a case – for example, if a complaint is resolved within 3.49 months, it is counted as three – the Society’s 53% figure would fall to 49%, requiring a more substantial improvement to 55%. The targets for years two and three are tougher. Ms Paraskeva agrees, adding that the practice of rounding down will cease from January. ‘This demonstrates the stretching nature of the targets being set by the LSCC,’ she says.


However, Ms Manzoor stresses, it is not just about targets but about outcomes and consistency in decision-making as well. ‘The Society has a lot of pilots running, but you need to be clear why you are doing them – what they are going to achieve, will they bring costs down? It is pretty basic stuff.’


Ms Manzoor maintains that her two roles as LSO and LSCC are ‘complementary’, with the first enabling her to pick up trends which the LSCC could then investigate. As LSCC, she has set the Law Society a target that 70% or more of the cases referred to her as LSO result in the Society’s handling of the complaint being upheld. The percentage between May and August was 64%.


She wants to be as open as possible about the LSCC’s work. ‘Our business plan is on our Web site (www.olscc.gov.uk) to be shot down if people want to.’ So far, she has taken on 12 staff in the Leeds office of the LSCC (the LSO’s office is in Manchester), which she will build up to 16 by the end of January. Her office is divided into three branches – professional body performance, investigation and corporate services – plus an advisory board.


As Ms Manzoor develops her new role, she sees no problem that Sir David Clementi’s report may recommend changing the whole nature of regulation. ‘Whatever he recommends, there will be a long timetable ahead and it will probably be 2007 before you get to implementation, so it is important to press for improvements now.’


Clementi may also do her out of her LSCC job. ‘In my response to him, I advocated that my office should go.’ She suggests that a client who is still unhappy after complaining to the solicitor and his firm should be able to turn to an independent complaints-handling body responsible for all five legal professional groups – solicitors, barristers, legal executives, licensed conveyancers and patent agents. Serious issues of conduct should then go to the professional bodies to help them maintain standards.


What is important, she says, is that there is a clearer split between representation and regulation – ‘you can’t be the England manager and then referee a crucial match’. The Law Society Council has already voted for this in principle.


The consumer group Which? has been highly critical of the Society’s handling of complaints and has also called for an independent authority to take responsibility for them.


Emma Harrison, senior public affairs officer, says: ‘The LSCC is a good interim measure. It should help improve the consumer experience, but the problems are probably endemic. What needs to happen is that solicitors are trained to deal with complaints better at the outset, as their customer care seems to be woefully inadequate. Unlike most retail markets – which is, after all, what this is – the consumer is not king.’


For Professor Avrom Sherr, director of the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies at the University of London, who has in the past researched the issue of complaints against solicitors, it seems a ‘very strange time’ to launch the LSCC office when Clementi is scheduled to report this month.


He agrees that solicitors need to be educated in dealing with complaints, where possible, on a consumerist basis. ‘I accept there is a major problem, but it is as much a problem of culture as it is of system. Lawyers could behave in a different way towards complaints if they are trained that they don’t have to answer everything as if they are being accused of murder.


‘I am also not convinced of the government’s position that the Law Society’s trade unionist activities are dreadful. I actually think that utilising the benefits the Law Society can achieve on behalf of lawyers is a very good way of harnessing their goodwill to do the things they might not wish to do.


‘Dragging them kicking and screaming through a regulatory hedge is probably not going to achieve good value for clients.’


Grania Langdon-Down is a freelance journalist