Complaints against law firms rose 37%. Most of them are about communication.

The Legal Ombudsman received 14,259 new complaints in 2025/26 — a 37% increase on the previous year, and the highest volume it has recorded.

That figure matters less than what sits underneath it. Complaints to the Ombudsman are not, for the most part, allegations that a lawyer got the law wrong. They are overwhelmingly about service: not being kept informed, delay, and calls that were never returned.

Where the increase came from

Residential conveyancing accounted for almost three-quarters of the growth in accepted complaints — 886 of the 1,209 additional cases compared with 2024/25.

Conveyancing is the practice area where client anxiety is highest and the cost of silence is greatest. A client mid-chain who cannot reach their solicitor does not wait patiently; they escalate.

What this means for firms

A complaint that reaches the Ombudsman has already failed twice: once in the original service, and once in the firm's own complaints handling. Both failure points are communication problems before they are legal ones.

The uncomfortable implication is that the cheapest complaints reduction available to most firms is not better lawyering. It is answering the phone.