A. Williams & Co. (Solicitors)

Complaints Procedure

In the unlikely event you have complaints about our service please note that we are committed to providing a high quality service and therefore have devised a simple and quick procedure to resolve any problems using an informal and a more formal process to resolve the problem.

Please note that our complaints procedure is as follows:

INFORMAL PROCESS

1. We will deal with all your complaints in the first instance by discussing same with you with a view to resolving the complaint informally.

2. If we are unable to resolve the complaint informally, we will record the full details of your complaint and request for clarifications to your complaint if required.

3. If we are unable to informally resolve your complaint with you following your clarifications, we will proceed under a formal process.

FORMAL PROCESS

4. We will ask you to provide details regarding the complaint in writing.

5. You can expect to receive a reply from us by letter within five working days of the receipt of your complaint.

6. We will then ask you to reply to our letter detailing how we can resolve your complaint.

7. When we acknowledge your reply we will confirm what will happen next as follows;

a) We will start to investigate your complaint. We will investigate your complaint within 10 working days, send you our detailed reply and invite you to a meeting to hopefully resolve your complaint.

b) Within 5 working days of the meeting we will write to you to confirm what took place and any solutions we have agreed with you. If you do not want a meeting or it is not possible, we will send you a detailed reply to your complaint. This will include our suggestion for resolving the matter. We will do this within 5 working days of completing our investigation.

c) At this stage, if you are still not satisfied, you can write to us again to request for an independent expert to review our decision. We will then arrange for a solicitor or other expert to review your complaint and our decision and respond to us within 10 working days. We will let you know how long this process will take.

REVIEW

d) We will let you know the result of our review within 5 working days of the end of our review. At this time we will write to you confirming our final position on your complaint and explaining our reasons. However, if you do not respond to our request in 7(c) above, we will assume that your do not wish that an expert review the matter further.

e) At the end of our firm's complaints procedure, if you are still unhappy with the outcome, within 6 months from the end of our firm's complaints procedure you may contact the Legal Services Ombudsman about your complaint at the following address:

Legal Ombudsman
P.O. Box 6806
Wolverhampton
WV1 9WJ

The Solicitors Regulation Authority can help you if you are concerned about our behaviour. This could be for things like dishonesty, taking or losing your money or treating you unfairly because of your age, a disability or other characteristic. You can raise your concerns with the Solicitors Regulation Authority.

f) Complaints to the Legal Ombudsman must usually be made within six years of the act or omission about which the client is complaining occurring, or
Complaints to the Legal Ombudsman must usually be made within three years from when the client should have known about or become aware that there were grounds for complaint.

Services Provided

Work Done

Please contact us for more details on any of the foregoing :

EMPLOYMENT LAW

We represented clients on a wide range of employment matters, including;

redundancy, unfair dismissal, wrongful dismissal
race discrimination claims
sexual harassment claims
disability discrimination
drafting compromise and conciliation agreements

Example of recent work;

Filing a claim on behalf of a probationary employee against her employer for 'automatically unfair dismissal,' and representing the employee at the Tribunal.
Acting on behalf of an employer in the private sector in relation to a claim for sex discrimination, breach of contract and personal injury and working with ACAS towards reaching a conciliated agreement.
Providing advice to an employee in public office in respect of discrimination claims against the employer.

FAMILY LAW

We provided advice and representation in the following areas;

separation and judicial separation .
divorce petition grounds.
financial matters arising out of separation or divorce.
Review of tax and pensions matters.
International and jurisdictional issues.
Injunctions and restraining orders.
Cohabitation and premarital contracts.

Where children were involved, our areas of advice and assistance included:

Custody issues and maintenance payments towards the children.
Residency issues.
Contact order issues.
International Adoption advice.
International Wardship and guardianship issues.

WILLS & INTESTACY

We have represented and provided advice to international clients in matters involving contentious probate and intestacy disputes either directly or through our vast network of international law firms sometimes where the client could not travel overseas or where litigation had already been commenced against the client in the UK or overseas.