John W Davies Solicitors Reviews 119

Instructed this solicitor for conveyancing work (purchase and sale). Unfortunately, the property we purchased was never registered with Land Registry. Not been an easy journey (10 months to registration, fast tracked by Land Registry following two complaints to them regarding no advice on how to resolve). Best advice is to contact the SRA for your files and get an independent local solicitor to complete the work. If we hadn't taken this approach, I have no idea when our registration would have been completed - as intervening solicitors appointed by SRA were non-responsive to communications from ourselves and crucially Land Registry. If you have similar problems contact the legal ombudsman to complain about intervening solicitors as they were the root cause of our struggles.

We used John W Davies as it was a referred solicitor from the estate agent Taylors. We complete the purchase in June 2021 and now in shock that our land registry isn't complete. The closure team hadn't responded to any of my enquiries and requests to obtain original files and I had been seeking advice from SRA and Ombudsman. I had been turned down by other solicitors to help with our case. It's a nightmare and I can't believe as a regulated industry and firm, this is the current state the the clients are in.

If you are caught in a situation like mine, I'd encourage you to also contact Legal Ombudsman so our situations are heard and responded to.

We purchased a house back in March of 2021 and have not received our deeds. I figured there was a backlog due to covid so didn't chase it. However when we received a email stating they were closing down I felt a slight panic.. after chasing and chasing I found out they NEVER filed the paperwork with the land registry!!!!
I've emailed to find out where our files have gone but getting no response.
Absolutely horrible experience

My mum had her will re-written November 2021, and we left it with jw Davies for safe keeping. Sadly my mum died 1st March and when we tryed to get in contact we just hit a wall, no answer by phone or email then to discover they had closed, trying to contact to get the will back can anybody help?

I had a bad enough experience with them when I was purchasing my property but now they have clos d permanently they have managed to lose/ send all of my personal documents to someone else. They sent me a parcel with 3 bits of paper belong to my property and all of the rest belonged to a property in a completely different part of the country! I am still waiting for my documents/personal information and I don't expect I'll get it now. Disgusting customer service!

Disgusted. Utterly disgusted. I was near the end of my conveyancing for purchasing my first ever home, to receive a phone call from my estate agents stating my solicitors had gone into liquidation (JW Davies). I then received an email after calls not being answered confirming they would shut from 31st January but “I didn’t have to do anything as my files would transfer to a different firm”. I tried called and emailing any department I could asking for a correspondence address for this “new firm down the road” with no luck and now I’m none the wiser. They have £250 of my money for searches which I have been advised by new solicitors can’t be used due to mortgage lenders criteria. Danielle Evans appears to be the director of JW DAVIES solicitors as well as the Director of 2 property developements ‘ME developments limited’ and ‘Bauen Developements limited’. If they treat all their clients like this and run off with their money without an ounce of communication, then I am appalled.

Really disappointing. Searched the wrong property with land registry and told me it wasn’t registered , then suddenly closed which is sad for the staff but it was handled terribly via contradictory emails meaning if you aren’t on the ball you may never have known your file isn’t being transferred and you need to instruct a new solicitor. I am sure they weren’t always this bad but I felt the communications were awful

I used John W Davies for a house purchase in late 2019 and they were outstanding. Jessica Day was my solicitor and she was on hand to answer all queries. So when I needed to sell/purchase at the end of 2021 I thought I’d use JWD again. What a mistake. They have completely changed their operating practise so for the whole 3 months my case was held by them I did not get to speak to the solicitor once and instead got the ‘Client Services Team’ who either took forever to reply or didn’t give me the correct information! And then yesterday I was informed they were closing from 31st January but ‘don’t worry - your file will be transferred to a firm taking over company’ - I queried this and am so glad I did as the next email I got completely contradicted the original letter telling me they had no plans to continue work on case and if ‘time was of the essence’ I should find a new firm. The only good thing I can say is they transferred the case to my new solicitor very promptly. So utterly disappointed and I wish all the staff the best now the firm is closed however the method of dealing with client cases was shockingly awful.

One of the worse companies to deal with. No response to email or calls. No is able to get hold of them. Avoid at all cost. You would think these reviews help a company do better however they don't take things seriously.

Absolutely great service from start to finish, quick and easy service with great communication. Highly recommended.

Great service, would definitely use John W Davies Solicitors again. They kept us informed throughout the process and were extremely helpful throughout. Thank you!

Very happy with the service. They were prompt with replies in most cases and very reassuring during the later stages of the process. I liked the online dash board showing buying and selling process and what had been done, however, I would have liked to have seen this updated more promptly.

Having emailed 3 times and receiving no response since late September I have just emailed a formal complaint to the address advised on your website. It has been returned stating you're inbox is full.
Please advise where i can direct my formal complaint to so it will be acknowledged and dealt with

This company has the worst customer service I’ve ever seen. Thank god I did not commission them to sell my house.

I got a quote from them and they sent me an email saying I could arrange a 15 minute chat via their calendly system. I did this, and the time came and went. No call. I emailed to state this was disappointing and what had happened. Thinking I’d receive an apology and accept a mistake. Nope, they simply stated that calls don’t take place at the time I selected… I queried how ridiculous this was and then received a response saying it was a mistake and would I still like my questions answering. I stated yes but notes my disappointment at this very disjointed and poor communication. I then waited half a day and no response to questions. I then received an email saying they would no longer take the case. Honestly, what the heck! If they can’t even get the sales right, what will it be like in the conveyancing process!

Also, I noticed many of their reviews are limited to certain dates. So they have fairly high ratings, but these are based on a year ago…

Excellent service, communication all the way throughout and acted fast but precise.

Thank you.

We instructed John W Davies Solicitors back in February 2020. Associated fees were explained from the outset and information on the appointed Conveyancer & Team 1 were communicated from the outset giving us clear contact details. Then COVID struck. During this time clearly communication was a lot harder and like everyone else they had to find new ways of working. Another complication for us was the original property vendors pulled out at the very last minute - all fees associated with this transaction were waived. Long story short it took another 3 attempts to finally complete on a property. Through all that there were times whereby it was difficult to make contact, but they made it clear that cases that were likely to meet the stamp duty holiday would take priority. Because of the choices we made selecting properties with uncooperative vendors, delays in our purchases were not the solicitor's fault. Once we were in a better position, Theresa and the team pulled out all the stops to make it happen. Yes we needed to sometimes prompt, but as I said because of the booming house markets they were busy people. I would like to thank Theresa and the team for getting our purchase over the line and recommend their services.

We didn't have the best start and it took some time to finally sell and move into our new home. Thank you especially to Leonie and Jasmin in jwd team 1

I would strongly advise avoiding them. Communication is terrible, their phone lines have been shut down and email response time is apparently 5 days (though I have waited longer for a response). Neither our buyer or sellers solicitors can ever get hold of them. A straight forward transaction is taking 5 months so far and still not complete. Very unhelpful and slow. No updates what so ever. Just an absolute waste of time dealing with them.

I am giving them two stars, because if you complain, and then keep complaining, they actually seem to start working. But they make life stressful for no apparent reason.

The below detail the points I found to not be acceptable, and it seems my experience is not unique, so if you do go with them, be prepared to potentially go through similar:

1. No dedicated solicitor, no contact details given for the solicitor in charge of your file.

2. Communications are sent to a shared email address. Rarely the same person replying through the course of a query. If you ask to be called, that is ignored.

3. Reply times are slow. I appreciate they were busy, but, the reply times are consistently slow and there is no apology for it, so I presume it is their standard service, so if you want prompt service, look elsewhere.

4. They miss documents you have sent them, which suggests their case management software, or use of that software is sub par. The other side chased documents they had had for a month. I got asked for documents they needed multiple times, sometimes months apart, sometimes days apart, but I had sent them to them already. When I pointed this out, they said they were unable to confirm if they 'had been received' which is farcical, given I emailed them to the email address I had used to communicated with them previously. Clearly they miss things and don't admit to it.

5. If you complain, they send you a document on how to complain, which in my case, was to email the guy I just emailed, to tell him why you are complaining, and what you want done about it...had to them reply to that to tell him he had that and he could log the complaint. He then says he has passed to the team and they will get back to me. Had to chase for about a week to get the answers I was seeking. Also, no real apology for their service (or lack of).

It took circa 5 months to sell an apartment with no chain either side...

The solicitor I am using for my purchase communicated more with me in 2 weeks than these guys did in 3 months. Even if these guys are hundreds of pounds cheaper, save for an extra month to avoid them.