Responding to consumers’ requests for documents General principles Original documents intended for the consumer belong to the consumer. Solicitors should always send client care letters and statute bills. So if a consumer hasn’t been sent one before, they should be sent one when they request it. Not doing so is a service failing – and the remedy will likely be providing one in a reasonable time (we’ll consider if there is any other detriment on a case-by-case basis). Copies of documents the consumer has previously been sent belong to the solicitor. If a consumer wants a copy, a solicitor should generally look to provide it. However, they may charge a reasonable fee to do so. If there’s a dispute about what’s reasonable, we’ll decide that on a case-by-case basis – looking at information including what the solicitor originally told the consumer about file storage costs. Consumer complains about fee for providing copy of bill – we agree admin fee is reasonable Mr A emailed his former solicitors, asking for the client care letter from when they represented him in a personal injury claim several years ago. The solicitors said he should have received a client care letter at the start of his case, and would need to charge him for what he was now asking for. Mr A agreed that he had probably been sent the letter at the time, but had lost it. The solicitors provided Mr A with a copy, charging a £25 administrative charge reflecting the time and cost of getting the file out of storage, photocopying the client care letter and sending it to him. Mr A wasn’t happy with this and complained to us. We found that it was clear in the solicitor’s file closure letter that Mr A’s file would be put in off-site storage three months later, and that there would be a cost for retrieval. In our view, the solicitors had charged a reasonable fee for providing what Mr A had asked for. Consumer complains that solicitor won’t provide client case letter – we tell them to provide it Ms B emailed her former solicitors asking for the client care letter from when they represented her in a personal injury claim several years ago. The solicitors said her file had been sent to an off-site archive, and that because she’d previously been sent a client care letter, they wouldn’t send her a copy now. Ms B complained to us about this decision. In our view, asking for a copy of the client care letter was a reasonable request – even if the firm needed to make a reasonable charge for the time involved. We discussed this with the solicitors and they arranged, for a small fee, for a copy of the client care letter to be made so Ms B could collect it from their office reception.
Deciding whether complaints are in time – requests for bills General principles In complaints about information requested not being provided, we will generally say the date of the refusal is the consumer’s date of awareness for time limit purposes. However, it’s possible that a consumer could have been aware they might have cause to complain – for example, because they saw an advert about claiming legal fees – some time before taking action. If a solicitor says they believe a consumer should have complained sooner, we will ask the consumer or their representative about the reasons for the delay, and make a decision on a case-by-case basis. Solicitor tells us complaint is out of time – we decide date of awareness is date of receiving legal advice about deductions Mrs C complained to her former solicitors that she had been unfairly charged a 100% success fee in a case two years ago. She said she had been told by another law firm that a percentage nearer 35% would have been more appropriate, and that she was several thousand pounds worse off than she should be. The solicitors said they had acted in line with the agreement she signed before starting her case, and that their fees were in line with industry standards. Mrs C then complained to us. The solicitors told us we shouldn’t look at the complaint under our Scheme Rule 5.4b, because Mrs C had contacted us outside our one-year time limit. They said that if she’d wanted to complain, she should have done so two years ago, after her case closed and she’d been sent details of her settlement. We agreed that Mrs C could have seen then how much had been deducted from her settlement. But in our view, she only knew there could be an issue with how much had been deduced after being given advice to that effect from the other law firm. So we took the date of awareness as the date of her receiving this advice – which was well within a year of her coming to us. Solicitor tells us complaint is out of time – we agree that date of awareness is date of receiving details of settlement Mr D complained that his solicitors didn’t tell him how much they were going to take from his damages settlement after his personal injury claim. The solicitors said they had acted in line with the agreement he’d signed, and that their fees were in line with industry standards. The solicitors told us we shouldn’t look at the complaint under our Scheme Rule 5.4b, because Mr D had contacted us outside our one-year time limit. They said that if he’d wanted to complain, he should have done so two years ago, after his case closed and he’d been sent details of his settlement. In this case, we agreed. Mr D had been unhappy since receiving the settlement, rather than receiving new advice in the interim that made him realise he might have cause to complain.
Complaints about how fees have been calculated and communicated General principles If a lawyer intends to charge a success fee that is calculated based on risk, the reasoning behind the calculation should be provided to the consumer. If it isn’t, we might decide they haven’t had the information they need about how their costs are run up. If a lawyer intends to charge a success fee that isn’t based on risk, or which includes other elements alongside risk, this needs to be clearly explained to the consumer clearly at the outset, and the overall costs must be reasonable. Consumer complains about level of success fee – we agree middle ground Mr E complained that he’d been charged an unfairly high success fee by his previous solicitors. The fee had been 100% of base costs, but he’d since been told by another law firm that a percentage nearer 20% would have been more appropriate. He felt he was several thousand pounds out of pocket and eventually referred a complaint to us. We asked the solicitors how they had decided on their 100% uplift. They showed us what they told Mr E at the outset, which was that they took into account all the facts of his case, reflecting the risk of defeat and the risk of recovery of damages. Mr E’s case followed his involvement in a car accident. His car had been hit from behind at traffic lights in a well-lit area, with the defendant being insured. The argument of 100% based on risk seemed hard to defend in this context. However, the solicitor argued that Mr E’s significant injury required medical assessment and treatment, and there was a concern about his assessment of his lost earnings. In our view, the claim was not without risk – but while the firm’s 100% fee wasn’t appropriate, Mr E’s proposal of 20% was also unrealistic. After we’d explained our thoughts to both parties, they agreed a remedy that took into account both a correction to the success fee (a refund of fees) and compensation for the shock of Mr E learning that he’d been overcharged. This case was subject to our case fee because it was settled only after we’d accepted it for an investigation, and the remedy was higher than the one the solicitors had made as part of their own complaints process (which in this case had been nothing). Consumer complains about success fee – we decide she had made informed choice Miss F complained that she’d been charged an unfairly high success fee by her previous solicitors. The fee had been 100% of base costs, but she’d since been told by another law firm that a percentage nearer 20% would have been more appropriate. She felt she was several thousand pounds out of pocket and eventually referred a complaint to us. We asked the solicitors how they decided on their 100% uplift. They sent us their client care information, which explained they charge 100% in all cases, rather than using risk as a basis for calculation. The letter said that other solicitors might have lower rates, and consumers were free to shop around, but that they would provide a “high quality service, using a team with over 200 years of experience between them in dealing with accident claims”. Miss F had signed and returned the Conditional Fee Agreement. Miss F had been a passenger in a car hit in an accident, which had been attended by the police. Miss F had had a short amount of time off work with minor injuries, but with an excellent prognosis for recovery. The defendant driver of the other car had admitted fault and was insured. If the fees had been risk-based, we didn’t think this could have been a 100% uplift situation. However, they weren’t based on risk. Given what we’d seen, we concluded that the solicitors had made the details of the agreement clear, and Miss F had made an informed decision to proceed on that basis.
