SLAB reports positive feedback on Solicitor Contact Line advice
Solicitors providing advice through the Scottish Legal Aid Board's Solicitor Contact Line give a high level of service, according to a client satisfaction survey carried out by SLAB.
The scheme is used to provide advice to people detained in police custody. A survey of a sample of users of the service in June and July this year found that 100% of respondents felt that the overall service they received from the SLAB solicitor was very good (90%) or good (10%).
There was also 100% agreement that the solicitor listened to them, explained things clearly in a way that
they could understand and treated them with respect, and that respondents trusted the solicitor to act in
their best interests. Almost all agreed that the solicitor made them feel that they could ask him or her questions (one person said this was not relevant).
In addition, 94% of respondents agreed that the solicitor advised them on what to say or do during the police interview, while the remaining 6% neither agreed nor disagreed.
Other findings include that 84% of respondents remember being given the letter of rights; 87% felt that they had enough privacy when talking to the solicitor on the phone; and 78% were satisfied with the length of time they had to wait to speak to a solicitor (10% were neither satisfied nor dissatisfied, and 16% were dissatisfied).
The sample size was 31, being those able to provide contact details and who could then be contacted to be interviewed out of 342 people provided with advice over the two week sample period, which SLAB considers "a good response rate for research of this kind".