We went with Simply Conveyancing (SC) following our estate agents recommendation. I now regret that decision. At the start SC seemed well organised and efficient. The secure online portal looked useful and easy to use. Our nominated solicitor was pleasant and answered our phone queries. However, I first became concerned when we were repeatedly asked for documents and certificates that we had already provided to SC. Whilst we were confident that we had provided the documents to SC (they had clearly been uploaded the online portal) we still found ourselves providing further copies to try to expedite the process. SC clearly hadn’t looked in the online portal, this lack of attention to detailed concerned us so early in the process.
Then our buyers solicitor asked for us to prepare and provide a Deed of Variation in relation to our Land Registry Title for the sale. SC informed me that it wasn’t their company policy to prepare this type of deed. SC’s position on this issue just astounded us. We would never have chosen to use them if we had realised that SC wouldn’t prepare a document which was required to facilitate the sale of our property. We still don’t understand how you can claim to be property lawyers then choose not to prepare property related legal documents? After I challenged SC’s company policy I was told that they would draft the required deed. However this document was ultimately not completed by SC, but it was drafted by the developers of the house that we were selling. The first draft deed sent to us contained a spelling error relating to our home address. I pointed out the error to our SC solicitor, who told me that it would be corrected before the final draft of the deed. When the final draft was sent to us to sign the spelling error was still in the text of the deed. Having lost confidence in SC I edited the PDF myself and corrected the error, before sending the signed deed back to SC. This was completely unacceptable to us. You pay property solicitors to represent you and you expect them to safely and professionally manage your sale and purchase. You should not expect simple spelling errors to be overlooked and when you point them out they should immediately be corrected. This lack of attention to detail really concerned us.
The financial statement was later forwarded to us for information prior to completion. We noticed that a £210 fee that we had paid to SC for the preparation of the Deed of Variation was not itemised on our statement. To us this was another attention to detail issue. I queried this omission, but was told that it didn’t need to be shown in our statement, as the money had been forwarded to the developer to prepare the deed. I didn’t agree with this, as we paid SC not the developer. That transaction should have been reflected in our financial statement, not omitted as it suited SC.
Then on the day of completion we knew that our buyers funds had reached SC, as we had a message that our sale had completed around 11am. The person whose house we were buying had his funds (realised from our sale) transferred to his bank account at approximately midday. Our money still hadn’t been transferred to our bank by 3:15pm, and it was Friday afternoon. We were obviously concerned, and we couldn’t help wondering if SC had made another error on details, and we started to worry that our funds might have been misdirected in error. So I called SC to query why we were still waiting for our money when our sale completed some four hours before my call? It might just be a coincidence but shortly after I called SC the outstanding funds suddenly appeared in our bank account.
So both our sale and purchase finally completed, but we now find ourselves really scrutinising anything sent to us by SC. We have been left with a nagging doubt about our title deeds relating to our purchase and stamp duty payments being finalised correctly. We are disappointed that we feel like this but it’s down to what was simply errors in attention to detail, a facet which in our opinion Simply Conveyancing seem to lack. I shared my concerns with SC when they contacted me via telephone for feedback following completion.
I was later contacted by a SC representative from their Cardiff office who was looking into our case. I offered him all the emails that I have regarding key issues mentioned above. That offer was not taken up. We shall see if we get updated regarding the outcome of the SC review of our case.
Update April 24th 2025: Sadly no I’ve had no further contact from Simply Conveyancing despite being told that my case would be investigated and I would be contacted. It just reinforces to me that Simply Conveyancing only cares about making money and customers are just not valued. I would never use their services again for a property transaction.
