Another nail in the Coffin for lawyers everywhere (Coffin Mew LLP)

Member Name: SWSt

Product:	Coffin Mew LLP
Date:	10/07/09 (184 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Good website for tracking progress...

Disadvantages: ...If they can be bothered updating it, slow service and poor communication

Apologies to Mrs SWSt, who's sick of hearing this, but come the revolution, estate agents and lawyers will be amongst the first up against the wall. And apologies to any of my readers who work in those professions. I'm sure you're lovely people really, but in my experience I'd rather trust a shark.

Anyway, as you've probably gathered from recent reviews, I've been trying to sell my house and have wasted tons of my time trying to get estate agents and lawyers to actually do the job I'm paying them for.

To deal with the sale of our property, we selected Coffin Mew, a firm based in the South of England miles away from where we live. This might sound like a crazy decision but it (sort of) made sense at the time. The estate agent we initially signed up with had close connections with this firm, which we hoped would cut down on potential delays - since all transactions were essentially internal matters and could be dealt with more efficiently. Fat chance.

Due to this arrangement, Coffin Mew are not the cheapest. They essentially pay the estate agent the equivalent of a "finder's fee" - which, of course, is simply passed on to the hapless client. I was well aware of this but, since speed was more important than cost (my new employer was picking up the tab for relocation expenses), I hoped the advantages would outweigh the costs and signed up.

Coffin Mew have several offices in places like Portsmouth and Southampton, although this review is of my experience of dealing with the Fareham branch. Similarly, they deal with a wide range of legal issues, both criminal and civil; again, this review purely concentrates on their conveyancing department. If my experience is indicative of their overall quality of service, I never want them defending me in court.

Signing up was relatively easy, because, of course, they are after your money! They send out the usual glossy brochure outlining why you should choose them, together with a quote for their costs (although being lawyers, there is the usual caveat that actual costs may differ if there are additional complications). Included in this pack are the contract for you to sign, plus a number of other standard documents (property information form etc.). Sending out these at an early stage makes sense - it means all the paperwork is ready so that as soon as you have a buyer, progress can be made. At least that's the theory.

They also have a website which you can use to track progress on your sale online. Theoretically, every time a major milestone in the purchase is completed, the website is updated to reflect this. Except Coffin Mew don't appear terribly good at this aspect. There were several occasions when I returned documents promptly, only to find that around five days later the website was still reading "awaiting return of documents from you." I had to ring them up to confirm they had received the documents, chase up progress and prompt them to update the website so that it was accurate and up-to-date. This is precisely what the website is meant to prevent, so why they don't use it more efficiently, I don't know.

On the plus side, you can send a secure email via this site to the nominated person for your case and I found this to be easily the most effective method of communicating with them. Coffin Mew refuse to give out "normal" telephone numbers for the direct line to your particular lawyer. All you get is an 0845 number. Calling this at peak time, particularly from a mobile, is expensive - especially when you have to ring several times about the same matter. Secondly, the person assigned to my case didn't appear to be terribly efficient and was appalling at returning my calls. Emails appear to be dealt with by a different person, who usually got back to me within one working day. The final benefit of this system is that a written record is kept of all correspondence, making it easier to prove what was agreed in case of a dispute.

In terms of other communication, Coffin Mew are not great. As mentioned above, you are assigned a lawyer for your case and they are your first point of contact, which didn't work well for me. Right at the start of the process, I contacted her with a question which needed answering urgently before I could return the contract documentation. I rang up and was told she was busy, so left my number on the promise she would ring back "shortly". When I still hadn't received a call by the next day, I contacted her again. Once more, I was told she was busy and would get back to me. When lunchtime came and went with no reply, I rang again... same story. I then followed this up with an email. Eventually, I phoned a fourth time, explained the problem to the person who answered the phone and they sorted it. My solicitor finally responded to my "urgent" five days after the initial request was made. This wasn't a one-off and I quickly learned that the best way to get a response was either just to ask whoever answered the phone or send an email via the secure website.

Given that one of the main reasons for selecting Coffin Mew was speed, they failed here too. Our sale should actually have been about as simple as it gets. The property was vacant and mortgage free, so there were no complications regarding redemption or dates of possession. The buyer was making a cash purchase, so there were no issues surrounding mortgage approvals and surveys. Both parties wanted to conclude the matter as quickly as possible... Coffin Mew wanted to drag it out. There never seemed to be any progress until I got on to them to find out what was going on. As soon as I sent an email asking for an update or expressing concern about the lack of progress, there would be a flurry of activity, and then everything would go quiet until I contacted them again. The only way to get them to work on the case appeared to be to make a nuisance of myself by emailing on a regular basis demanding progress. Call me naïve, but when I pay a group of professionals to do a job, I don't expect to have to watching over their shoulders the whole time. The "nuisance tactics" worked to a degree, but it was clear they were getting fed up of me, as their responses to my emails were increasingly terse! But then, if they'd been doing their job in the first place I wouldn't have needed to pester them. It was definitely a case of if you shouted loudest, your file was brought to the top of the pile. If you left them to get on with it, your case slipped further and further down the list of priorities.

Coffin Mew didn't do anything wrong enough to lead to a formal complaint but their service was inefficient and slow. Next time I select a solicitor, it will be a local one with a local office and a local phone number; one that I can call in on whenever I need to speak to them. I certainly won't be using Coffin Mew again, and would advise you to do the same.

Basic Information
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Coffin Mew
Fareham Point
Wickham Road
Fareham
PO16 7AU
Tel: 01329 825 617
Email: fareham@coffinmew.co.uk
Website: http://www.coffinmew.co.uk/index.htm

© Copyright SWSt 2009

Summary: Hire a local lawyer instead. If these are your local lawyers, hire one from the next county!