According to the Law Society, the names of property solicitors who have had complaints made against them should be made public.

Carol Ann Casey stated in her latest report that many lawyers were still not complying with the need to issue a ‘Section 68 letter’ outlining their fees in advance.

She said that the public should be allowed more transparency because "solicitors need to be clear with their clients at the outset."

Her office handles grievances made by members of the public about how the Law Society dealt with their complaints based on solicitors.

Probate, conveyancing and family law accounted for the majority of complaints, and the basis of the woes were inadequate professional service, overcharging or misconduct.

The report

Casey’s report, which was published on her website and covers the period from October 2008 to September 2009, was also critical of delays by the society in processing complaints from its Complaints and Client Relations Committee to the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal.

She also attacked the fact that there were several complaints against certain solicitors, and that costs were not recouped from solicitors who do not co-operate.

While some measures existed allowing the society to consider multiple complaints against the same solicitor, the time span to be considered was only two years. She said this should be extended to five.

Asked whether there should be a central database that would inform people whether solicitors had had complaints upheld against them, she replied: "I agree that is a problem. There should be a way for the public to know about complaints upheld."

Ms Casey said she had expressed dissatisfaction in her last two reports with the delays in processing complaints by the society,: "The Law Society’s response is well short of my expectations and I await a constructive solution to this problem, be it through reallocating resources, appointing a person on a fixed-term contract etc," she said in the report.

There were 146 referrals to her office from October 1st, 2008 to the end of September 2009, focusing on complaints where the complainant was dissatisfied with the outcome, out of a total of 2,129 complaints made to the Law Society.

Of these, 24 were inadmissible for various explanations, such as it was out of time, it had not been investigated by the organisation in the first instance, it was still an ongoing investigation or it had been referred to the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal. Twenty-three of the remainder were referred by the adjudicator back to the Law Society for reconsideration.

The office of the Independent Adjudicator was set up in 1997 under a statutory instrument. The adjudicator is appointed by the president of the society and paid by the society, but is independent in the conduct of his or her functions, which are to review the way in which complaints are handled by the society.

The office is to be replaced by a Legal Services Ombudsman in the 2010, whose responsibility will include the complaints procedure in both the Law Society and the Bar Council.