OSS boosted by ombudsman's complaints report

The Office for the Supervision of Solicitors (OSS) received a boost this week as the Legal Services Ombudsman predicted that it was on course to meet government-set targets for this year.

She also reported a drop in complaints against solicitors.In her annual report, Ann Abraham said the OSS had closed most of its older cases and was largely meeting its turn-around targets for recent files.

However, she warned that it was still struggling to meet quality targets.Ms Abraham said there were 16,085 complaints to the OSS in 2000, a 6% drop on 1999.The report was welcomed by the Law Society, which said the OSS was well positioned to beat government targets.

It said that by April, 75% of cases received were resolved within three months (the target is 50%) and that by June it had exceeded the target six months running.In her report, the ombudsman commended the OSS for tackling its backlog and reducing the number of outstanding files from 17,000 in July 1999 to less than 6,000 by the end of December 2000.

Ms Abraham said: 'This is significant progress which the Lord Chancellor will no doubt wish to take into account when deciding whether to make use of his powers to appoint a legal service complaints commissioner later this year.'Despite that encouragement, the quality of complaints handling remains an issue.

Ms Abraham said in the report that her overall satisfaction level with the OSS last year fell to 57%, a two-point drop on the previous year and 10% down on 1997.

The target is 70%Ms Abraham, both in her report and an exclusive interview with the Gazette, praised the Law Society for its corporate governance and management reforms, but was concerned that the redress scheme - which includes a lay commissioner to deal with service complaints and possibly minor conduct matters - 'remains little more than a few paragraphs in a consultation paper'.The Law Society Council will be asked to approve a complaints redress scheme model this week.Law Society's chief executive Janet Paraskeva said: 'We are not complacent.

Although we are meeting most of our targets, the public still deserve a better service than the one they are getting at the moment.'