Conduct and service

One thing leads to another These days most solicitors give costs information at the outset of their retainer, though many could improve on the details provided.

However, the Office for the Supervision of Solicitors (OSS) still receives an alarming number of complaints where no costs information has been given, in even the simplest of cases.

Often, the standard of service throughout the matter is found to have been far below any acceptable level.Such a case involved a firm that had accepted instructions to act in the sale of a leasehold property.

The sale was completed in May and, as there was an outstanding liability for repairs, it was agreed the solicitors would retain 2,500 against that liability.

The firm undertook not to account to the client until they were released from their undertaking to pay for the repairs from the retained monies.

The arrangement was that the landlord would carry out the necessary work and the solicitors would then pay him from the retained monies and account to their client for the balance.An account was rendered by the landlords a week or two after completion of the work.

However, it was not settled until the following February - nine months after completion - and it wasn't until 24 March that the solicitors asked to be released from their undertaking (which release was given immediately) so they could account to their client.

Furthermore, it was only in February, when the repair bill was settled, that the solicitors sent their client a completion statement.

As if that wasn't bad enough, the solicitors then failed to account for interest earned on the monies held, having also ignored the client's telephone calls during the preceding months when she tried to find out when she would get the balance of her money.In view of all this, it's possibly to be expected that the solicitors then ignored their client's inevitable complaint.The picture presented to the OSS was simple enough.

Having failed to give the client any idea of the costs that would be involved in a routine conveyancing transaction, the solicitors then delayed in discharging the liability to the landlord, leading to a delay in their being released from their undertaking, resulting in a delay in their accounting to their client.

To cap it all, they failed to account for interest and ignored the client's communications and her subsequent complaint.The OSS halved the solicitors' fees and ordered them to pay their client 850 compensation, as well as to obtain a deposit interest certificate and account to the client for the interest due.l Every case before the compliance and supervision committee is decided on its individual facts.

These case studies are for illustration only and should not be treated as precedents.