The Legal Ombudsman (LeO) has published six Public Interest Decisions (May 2026) with a view to use insight from complaints to help drive and support improvements. The publication supports their goal to increase transparency and aims to highlight the compliance and conduct risks to individuals and law firms, arising from poor legal service delivery.
The cases reveal consistent failures in core controls, including inadequate client communication, insufficient verification of key information and weak case oversight. These issues point to broader compliance weaknesses in client care, file management and supervision.
The cases show that clients suffered serious financial harm, including eg. unexpected legal costs, missed limitation deadlines, and property purchases based on incorrect assumptions. LeO ordered remedies in all six cases, including compensation, cost reimbursement and payments for distress.
This underlines the regulatory expectation for robust systems to ensure accurate advice, clear risk communication, and proper handling of key steps. This includes verification of critical information, effective diarisation and deadline control, documented advice at key decision points, and appropriate supervision and sign-off for high-risk actions.
How to avoid non-compliance
A recurring theme was reliance on assumptions rather than appropriate checks, alongside poor client updates. From a compliance perspective, this emphasises the importance of having strong compliance frameworks including clear, documented communication and audit trails, robust supervision processes and internal controls.
Firms are urged to strengthen processes and employ effective oversight, to help ensure regulatory compliance and protect client interests.
CRL complaint handling requirements
This serves as a timely reminder to authorised individuals* and firms because complaints handling procedures should now be fully aligned with CRL’s Complaint Handling Rules, introduced in December 2025.
The revised rules require firms to maintain appropriate records of complaints and to use this information to identify risks, trends and opportunities for learning. Where few complaints are experienced in practice, drawing on wider sources such as LeO decisions and resources, can enhance understanding and support continuous improvement.
Adopting these practices will help firms strengthen their processes by delivering consistently high standards of client service. This will not only help foster trust, but will ultimately sustain client relationships, recommendations and repeat business.
* Individuals working in a firm regulated by another regulator, will need to comply with that regulator’s appropriate regulatory arrangements and guidance. Section 52(4) Legal Services Act 2007.
