Annual Report 2012-2013

The Scottish Legal Complaints Commission laid its fifth Annual Report before the Scottish Parliament on 17 December 2013.

The report covers the period from 01 July 2012 until 30 June 2013 and highlights our progress, the number and type of complaints coming to the SLCC and our Annual Accounts.

Insights from the report include:

• The SLCC is now dealing with more complaints per year
• Over the past year, £250,000 has been awarded in compensation and fee rebates
• Our free mediation service is an effective early complaint resolution method with 75% success rate

Additionally, to mark five years since our creation, we are releasing a review of five years of legal complaints data.  The data has revealed the issues and the legal areas which lead to most complaints:

• 1 in 5 complaints concerned residential conveyancing
• 57% of complaints relate to communication issues between practitioner and client

This year, we have also published advice and guidance for legal practitioners to assist in complaint prevention and to promote the early resolution of complaints.  This is in keeping with our strategic focus on early resolution.

Chief Executive of the SLCC,Matthew Vickers, said “We’ve made some significant improvements in our performance this year but there is no room for complacency. Where lawyers haven’t met the standards which the public should expect, we act to put things right. Where we do make awards we follow up strongly to ensure that redress becomes reality. We believe that our trend analysis and guidance contributes to improving legal services and we look forward to continuing to work with the professional bodies to build public trust and confidence in the Scottish legal profession.”

SLCC Chair,Bill Brackenridgecommented “The review is a good measure of progress and while there is still work to be done it clearly demonstrates the benefits of having an independent regulator. I would encourage the profession to continue to work closely with the SLCC in order to promote best practice, further reduce the number of complaints and continue to improve the reputation of the legal sector with clients, the public and stakeholders”.