Revised SLCC Rules in force from April

The Scottish Legal Complaints Commission has published updated rules which will come into force from 1 April 2023.

The changes, which follow two rounds of consultation, are intended to ensure that the rules reflect a digital and paperless focus in the SLCC’s operations and engagement with the profession, and to increase efficiency and clarify processes, taking account of changing communication methods and administrative tools.

They include: 

• Removing unnecessary barriers to digital processes throughout the complaints process, including clarifying that, where appropriate, communications can be sent by electronic means, and that mediations, oral hearings and determination committees can take place using digital channels.
• Simplifying the requirements to make a complaint, to remove unnecessary administrative barriers, clarify when a complaint is deemed to have been registered, and the information required by the SLCC in order to register a complaint.
• Allowing the SLCC to specify the form in which information required from practitioners or firms could most usefully be provided, in order to assist a transition to use of digital formats which will reduce delay and cost.
• Updating the section on confidentiality, to ensure that the rules comply with current confidentiality and data processing requirements.
• Updating the section on time limits in recognition of the time elapsed since the last changes to time limits came into force, bringing all complaints in line with the three-year time limit. In practice, this only has implications for a small number of service complaints where the service was first instructed pre-April 2017. The circumstances in which the SLCC may accept a complaint that has not been made within the specified time limits have also been clarified.
• Highlighting the focus on resolution, and the steps the SLCC may take to facilitate this.
• Making provision for the SLCC’s new powers and processes in relation to complaints about licensed legal services providers and approved regulators, as part of the alternative business structures scheme.

The rules were last updated in 2016. The SLCC's governing legislation, the Legal Profession and Legal Aid (Scotland) Act 2007, requires it to keep the rules under review and vary them whenever it considers it appropriate to do so. 

Niki Maclean, acting chair, commented: "This update to our rules is timely. Our 2020-24 strategy committed us to moving to a paperless and digital first approach, and the experience of the last few years has only underlined the importance of this.

"The amendments also respond to specific [instances] where we have identified that a change in the rules would be desirable to update or to clarify our processes and procedures. This includes updates relating to confidentiality, the requirements to make a complaint, a focus on resolution and gender-neutral language.  

"Together, these changes will ensure the SLCC is able to discharge its statutory duties as efficiently and effectively as possible."

The new rules, along with previous versions, can be found here.