which was not known about by us or our client when the matter began. We can’t simply ignore the evidence, we have to deal with it otherwise the case may be decided wrongly if and when the matter comes to Court. That may mean investigation well beyond the timescales which were originally envisaged and it may mean expert evidence if the new evidence isn’t thought to be authentic. The important thing though is to keep the client informed of what this is likely to do to fees, what the risks are in dealing with the matter further, and managing the client’s expectations about whether they now stand a greater or lesser chance of succeeding in the case.
that has and they have recommended us. Increasingly, however, when someone is thinking about whether to use us, they will look at our website, and then decide. I’m not really sure what then helps them decide one way or another. We have huge amounts of data about what pages people look at, how long they linger there, what works in terms of Google search terms, and who comes top of the poll in terms of staff profiles viewed, but none of that necessarily helps answer that particular question. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.
Well the obvious answer is “Of course!” but I think the lesson I take from our holiday experience as well as dealing with clients over 20 plus years is that expectations need to be managed, otherwise there will inevitably be a feeling of disappointment. For example, in the Rome hotel, its expensive super gastro restaurant closed for two evenings during our stay due to a private party. In reality, we probably wouldn’t have eaten there anyway because my wife is vegetarian and the menu was designed around carnivores, but had we wanted to celebrate there for one special night, it would have been good to know, in advance of the 24 hour notice we were given, that the expensive super gastro experience was off limits for the remaining duration of our stay. Similarly, if we know that despite our best efforts, and no matter how many people we have working on a client’s matter, it will simply not be possible to persuade a Court to deal with a specific possession hearing for at least another six weeks, there is no point in us promising a landlord that they will have their property back within a fortnight, even if they are understandably desperate for the matter to be dealt with urgently. Sometimes, this means that we have to give unwelcome advice, but clearly it is better to be frank about such matters at the beginning than have to face more painful realities some way into the case. Such considerations can also apply to legal fees. Please believe me when I say that we would love to be completely definite about how much a piece of legal work will cost. Much of the time, we can do so, because the progress of a matter is reasonably easy to predict, but sometimes it is just not possible, and even where estimates are given, unpredictable things can occur which throw such estimates up in the air. For example, in a Litigation case, evidence from the other party can be produced
4. Finally, what can we learn from feedback?
We can learn a great deal, but only if we ask the right questions and ask them at the right time. These are very difficult things to get right. I have to be honest and say (and as evidenced by the holiday feedback I was asked for) that I am inconsistent in how I deal with such requests myself. I feel I should always respond, because client and customer service is what I am passionate about and therefore want to give feedback to others if I expect it myself, but like many of us I don’t always live up to my ideals. However, some recent examples of feedback request I have seen have definitely been thought about carefully so as to make the consumer’s life easier. For example, we recently bought a fridge. The feedback form, delivered by e-mail, consisted of one question – “On a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 being ‘not very well’ and 5 being ‘very well indeed’, how did we do?” and the answer could be given by clicking the appropriate number of stars. It took 3 seconds. As a business we might want much greater detail than that but if we are really thinking about the client’s needs rather than our own, we need to make giving feedback as easy as possible. I’m going to work on that in terms of our own questionnaires over the next few weeks. That’s not to say that there shouldn’t be opportunities for people to give more detail if they are happy to do so. That’s why we have our Quality Consultant (QC) scheme – this gives us excellent opportunities to ask our clients, in a more rounded way, what we did well and what could still be improved. We achieve excellent results from our feedback questionnaires – 98% very satisfied or satisfied, but we don’t want to rest on our laurels. Improvement to 100% is the aim! By Chris Randall
2. Do people use us because we get rave reviews?
Review sites for Law firms are not yet commonplace. The ‘Solicitors from Hell’ site (not one on which we ever appeared I’m glad to say) was taken down after large numbers of complaints and then an injunction, because the site seemed to be publishing critical comments from disgruntled complainants without scrutinizing them for accuracy and there isn’t yet a Trip Advisor parallel in the legal world. However, Google has started allowing some subscribers (users of Google plus) to post reviews directly on to search pages – try searching using ‘Solicitors Brighton’ and you will see what I mean – and this trend is inevitably going to continue to pick up pace. Some firms, including Mayo Wynne Baxter, invite detailed comments from clients and publish the results online. There is of course some risk in such a strategy. No law firm, indeed no organisation, is ever going to get everything right 100% of the time, but we can all learn from our experiences, good or bad, and then make sure that we continue to improve.
3. Do people find that we live up to expectations?
7