Clients have a right to expect quality service from professionals. That does not mean that problems might not occur; there may be alternative outcomes from any business transaction but there are standards that a client should expect even if something goes wrong.
By definition, every professional has training and experience in his or her field and it is not unreasonable to expect that their training and experience will be used to good effect. If they are not, and something goes terribly wrong, there may well be a case to look at the situation and see if there has been any form of negligence and potential liability as a result.
That can happen in many fields; in the instance of property the problems can be anything from structural deficiencies to survey and valuation problems or legal advice provided.
A modern working office
What has gone wrong?
The property market has suffered in recent years; the subprime mortgage problems sparked off the problematic years in 2006/7 and the impact has reverberated around the world. It created a lack of demand for residential and commercial property and the natural consequence of that was a drop in property values.
Several companies and individuals have been affected. In some cases, there are justifiable claims that professionals in the ‘chain’ have been negligent with their advice and actions. That is something that may form the basis of a claim.
There is such a thing as professional responsibility; it does not go away just because economic difficulties exist. Those difficulties should have been taken into account at the time.
Negotiation and mediation
A legal firm specializing in negligence claims uses its experience and expertise to attempt to find a solution, initially perhaps through negotiation if their clients have suffered a loss that they attribute to negligence. Often a negotiation can keep the matter out of court because such a charge can be seriously bad publicity; the saying ‘there is no such thing as bad publicity simply is not true.
If negotiation fails, it does not automatically mean a visit to court; there are mediation facilities that may resolve the impasse that occurred during negotiations.
Negligence specialists can assess the strength of any claim and the likelihood of success and solicitors’ negligence help from Dewar Hogan is one way to find out if a claim is valid. There are obviously costs involved in getting professional help such as this and the basis for charges should be agreed upon from the outset.
On occasions in property transactions, there may be several different potential ‘defendants’ from surveyors to valuation experts to the solicitors who provided advice. Certainly, valuation is not an exact science but that does not mean that a supposed valuation expert is not liable if he or she is wildly inaccurate when looking at a property.
Many professionals have insurance against negligence claims; in many cases, it is compulsory to practice. That does not mean that professionals will not fight a claim; get your own professional to look after your interests.
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