Key Regulatory Information
We use “I”, “us”,”my” and “our” to refer to Stephen Thomas Law.
The Firm is a Sole Practitioner practice registered office at
8, Grassmere, Leybourne, West Malling , KENT ME19 5QP
I am a Solicitor-Advocate and qualified in April 1980.
In April 2000 I was granted the Higher Courts (Criminal Advocacy) Qualification which enables me to appear as an advocate at all Criminal Courts in England and Wales.
The firm VAT number is 909633909
Stephen Thomas LAW is a firm authorised and regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority and practices in accordance with the SRA’s rules, regulations and codes of practice. The SRA number is 465658 and the Regulations may be found at www.rules.sra.org.uk
APPROVED LEXCEL QUALITY STANDARD PRACTICE
Stephen Thomas Law is delighted to announce for the 12th year in succession the practice has successfully passed the Independent Lexcel Quality inspection carried out by the Law Society.
Lexcel is a legal practice quality mark for client care, compliance and practice management. It sets the standard for:
client care
risk management
people management
structure and strategy
financial management
information management
file and case management
Equality and diversity policy
We are committed to eliminating unlawful discrimination and to promoting equality and diversity within our policies, practices and procedures. This applies to our dealings with clients, personnel engaged by the business, external professionals and experts, anyone undertaking work experience and others. The Diversity Form is completed each year as required by the SRA.
Stephen is responsible for implementing and monitoring our Equality & Diversity policy. He undertakes a review of this policy annually to verify it is in effective operation and ensures that appropriate action is taken in relation to any non-compliance identified under this policy or barriers to equal opportunities.
We treat everyone equally and with the same attention, courtesy and respect regardless of:
sex (including marital status, gender reassignment, pregnancy, maternity and paternity);
sexual orientation (including civil partnership status);
race or racial group (including colour, nationality and ethnic or national origins);
religion or belief;
age;
caring responsibility; or
disability.
We take all reasonable steps to ensure that the firm does not unlawfully discriminate under:
the Equality Act 2010;
the Human Rights Act 1998;
Wherever possible, we take steps to promote equal opportunity in relation to access to the legal services that we provide, taking account of the diversity of the communities that we serve, in order to ensure that our services are accessible to all clients.
We are committed to meeting the diverse needs of clients. We will take steps to identify the needs of clients in the community and develop plans and procedures setting out how we will meet clients’ needs and for ensuring the services which we provide are accessible to all. We will take account, in particular, the needs of clients with a disability and clients who are unable to communicate effectively in English. We will consider whether particular groups are predominant within our client base and, where possible, will ensure that their needs are met.
We do not unlawfully discriminate in dealings with experts and third parties. All experts and third parties are instructed from a register of experts and have been assessed by the firm as being capable of meeting both our and our clients’ requirements. Experts and third parties are instructed because they satisfy our selection criteria
So far as clients are concerned Stephen is happy to meet disabled clients in their home or a more convenient location if appropriate.
We are committed to promoting equality and diversity in all my dealings with clients and third parties.
My practice is accredited with the Lexcel Legal Practice quality Mark.
Cyber Fraud
My firm complies with the requirements of the Cyber Essentials Scheme and holds a valid certificate. Our processes to protect against cyber crime are assessed annually through this scheme.
Please be aware that fraudsters are targeting law firm clients. By hacking into clients’ IT systems and using social engineering techniques, fraudsters can gain access to confidential e-mail correspondence and trick clients into sending funds to the wrong bank account.
If you receive an e-mail that purports to come from me informing you of a change to my bank account details, this is almost certainly fraudulent. Please telephone me as soon as possible (using the contact details on my site, email or my letterhead) and do not take any steps to send funds to the nominated bank account in the meantime. Before sending any funds to me please double check that the bank details are correct. I will not accept responsibility if you send money to the wrong bank account.
Data Protection and Privacy Policy
INTRODUCTION
Welcome to Stephen Thomas Law’s privacy notice.
Stephen Thomas LAW respects your privacy and is committed to protecting your personal data. This privacy notice will inform you how we look after your personal data when you visit our website (regardless of where you visit it from) and tell you about your privacy rights and how the law protects you.
This privacy notice deals with the specific areas set out below.
1. IMPORTANT INFORMATION AND WHO WE ARE
2. THE DATA WE COLLECT ABOUT YOU
3. HOW YOUR PERSONAL DATA IS COLLECTED
4. HOW WE USE YOUR PERSONAL DATA
5.COOKIES
6.. DISCLOSURES OF YOUR PERSONAL DATA
7. DATA SECURITY
8. YOUR LEGAL RIGHTS
1. IMPORTANT INFORMATION AND WHO WE ARE
This privacy notice aims to give you information on how Stephen Thomas Law collects and processes your personal data through your use of this website.
This website is not intended for children, and we do not knowingly collect data relating to children.
It is important that you read this privacy notice together with any other privacy notice or fair processing notice we may provide on specific occasions when we are collecting or processing personal data about you, so that you are fully aware of how and why we are using your data. This privacy notice supplements the other notices and is not intended to override them.
Stephen Thomas of Stephen Thomas Law is the controller and responsible for your personal data (collectively referred to as "Stephen Thomas Law"), "we", "us", or "our" in this privacy notice.
Please note pursuant to Article 6(1)(c) and 6(1)(f) of the GDPR your personal data will only be processed to comply with our legal obligations to you or any third party connected with this case or for the purpose of legitimate interests by us or a third party in order that we can deal with your matter effectively. As a solicitor, all of your information is dealt with on a totally confidential basis subject to the previous clause to enable me to successfully conduct your case.
Queries about this notice
If you have any questions about this privacy notice, including any requests to exercise your legal rights, please contact us using the details set out below.
Our full details are:
Stephen Thomas trading as Stephen Thomas Law is a sole trader
Email address: st@stephenthomaslaw.co.uk
Telephone number: 01732 321114 or 07774 612651
You have the right to make a complaint at any time to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues (www.ico.org.uk). We would, however, appreciate the chance to deal with your concerns before you approach the ICO, so please contact us in the first instance.
Third Party links
This website may include links to third-party websites, plug-ins and applications. Clicking on those links or enabling those connections may allow third parties to collect or share data about you. We do not control these third-party websites and are not responsible for their privacy statements. When you leave our website, we encourage you to read the privacy notice of every website you visit.
2. THE DATA WE COLLECT ABOUT YOU
Personal data, or personal information, means any information about an individual from which that person can be identified. It does not include data where the identity has been removed.
Through your use of this website, we may collect, use, store and transfer different kinds of personal data about you which we have grouped together as follows:
Technical Data includes internet protocol (IP) address, your login data, browser type and version, time zone setting and location, browser plug-in types and versions, operating system and platform and other technology on the devices you use to access this website.
Usage Data includes information about how you use our website.
If you complete a form within our website requesting advice or assistance or if you send us an email or contact us by telephone, we will keep a record of the information provided by you to enable us to provide you with a response. The information will be destroyed within 28 days of our last exchange of communications unless we have opened a file for you in which case the information will be moved to that file. If we open a file for you, you will receive our detailed Terms of Business which contain information in relation to Data Protection and file retention periods.
Changes to your personal details
It is important that the personal data we hold about you is accurate and current. Please keep us informed if your personal data changes during your relationship with us.
3. HOW YOUR PERSONAL DATA IS COLLECTED
We use different methods to collect data from and about you including through:
Automated technologies or interactions. As you interact with our website, we may automatically collect Technical Data about your equipment, browsing actions and patterns. We collect this personal data by using cookies, server logs and other similar technologies. We may also receive Technical Data about you if you visit other websites employing our cookies. Please see our cookie policy below for further details
Third parties or publicly available sources. We may receive Technical Data from analytics providers such as Google based outside the EU.
Usage Data includes information about how you use our website.
Data is collected from you in order that we can provide quotations for our services by you completing the forms within our website or by you sending us emails or telephoning us.
4. HOW WE USE YOUR PERSONAL DATA
At Stephen Thomas Law, we are committed to protecting your privacy. Set out below is an explanation of how we use information about visitors to this site.
a. We may use your Technical Data to administer and protect our website (including troubleshooting, data analysis, testing, system maintenance, support, reporting and hosting of data. Such use would be necessary for our legitimate interests (for running our business, provision of administration and IT services, to prevent fraud and in the context of a business reorganisation exercise), and to comply with a legal obligation.
b. We may use your Usage Data and Technical Data to deliver relevant website content to you and measure or understand the effectiveness of the content. Such use would be necessary for our legitimate interests (to study how customers use our services, to develop them, to grow our business and to inform market strategy).
c. We may use your Usage Data and Technical Data to use data analytics to improve our website, services, marketing, customer relationships and experiences. Such use would be necessary for our legitimate interests (to define types of customers for our services, to keep our website updated and relevant, to develop our business and to inform our marketing strategy).
Change of purpose
We will only use your personal data for the purposes for which we collected it, unless we reasonably consider that we need to use it for another reason and that reason is compatible with the original purpose. If you wish to get an explanation as to how the processing for the new purpose is compatible with the original purpose, please contact us.
If we need to use your personal data for an unrelated purpose, we will notify you and we will explain the legal basis which allows us to do so.
5. COOKIES
Like many websites, the website uses cookies – small text files, typically of letters and numbers – to capture limited information about the site’s users. The information is transferred by the website to the cookie file of the browser on the hard drive of the user’s computer. For general information about cookies please visit www.allaboutcookies.org.
You can set your browser to refuse all or some browser cookies, or to alert you when websites set or access cookies. If you disable or refuse cookies, please note that some parts of this website may become inaccessible or not function properly.
6. DISCLOSURES OF YOUR PERSONAL DATA
We do not share your personal data with other organisations for marketing purposes.
7. DATA SECURITY
We have put in place appropriate security measures to prevent your personal data from being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered or disclosed. In addition, we limit access to your personal data to those employees, agents, contractors and other third parties who have a business and need to know. They will only process your personal data on our instructions and they are subject to a duty of confidentiality.
We have put in place procedures to deal with any suspected personal data breach and will notify you and any applicable regulator of a breach where we are legally required to do so.
8. YOUR LEGAL RIGHTS
Under certain circumstances, you have rights under the data protection laws in relation to your personal data. Your rights are listed below:
· Request access to your personal data.
· Request correction of your personal data.
· Request erasure of your personal data.
· Object to processing of your personal data.
· Request restriction of processing your personal data.
· Request transfer of your personal data.
· Right to withdraw consent.
If you wish to exercise any of the rights set out above, please contact us.
You will not have to pay a fee to access your personal data (or to exercise any of the other rights). However, we may charge a reasonable fee if your request is clearly unfounded, repetitive or excessive. Alternatively, we may refuse to comply with your request in these circumstances.
We may need to request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity and ensure your right to access your personal data (or to exercise any of your other rights). This is a security measure to ensure that personal data is not disclosed to any person who has no right to receive it. We may also contact you to ask you for further information in relation to your request to speed up our response.
COMPLAINTS HANDLING LEAFLET
Although we aim to provide a quality service that is responsive to our clients’ needs, there may be occasions when clients are disappointed in some way with the service provided. This procedure aims to deal with such occasions as quickly and sensitively as possible. The procedure applies to all staff working in the practice.
1. At the start of any matter, clients must be sent a client care letter stating who will be dealing with their matter on a day-to-day basis with the details of their status (qualified/unqualified). It must also point out that any matters not satisfactorily dealt with by that person should be raised with Stephen Thomas informally by the client or by the member of staff themselves.
2. Clients who are regularly engaged in a number of simultaneous or sequential matters need not be sent a client care letter on each occasion.
3. If the problem is not resolved at this first stage, it must be referred to Stephen Thomas for further consideration. The complaint must be acknowledged in writing within 3 days and the client given an indication of the likely time that it will take to deal with the complaint, which should not normally exceed 3 weeks. If it is likely to take longer than that, the client must be sent a holding letter explaining the reason for the delay. A copy of this procedure must be sent to the client with the acknowledgement.
4. Following an appropriate investigation, a full written response to the client must be sent by Stephen Thomas. The written response must explain that, if a client is not satisfied with the response, they are entitled to complain to the Legal Ombudsman and will explain how they can be contacted.
5. The Legal Ombudsman expects complaints to be made to them within one year of the date of the act or omission about which you are concerned or within one year of you realising there was a concern. You must also refer your concerns to the Legal Ombudsman within six months of our final response to you following any complaint.
6. If the complaint relates to Stephen Thomas himself, following an appropriate investigation, he will send a full written response to the client. The written response must explain that if a client is not satisfied with the response, that they are entitled to complain to the Legal Ombudsman and will explain how the Ombudsman can be contacted.
7. Details of the problems or complaints raised by a client under this procedure and of any subsequent investigation must be carefully documented.
8. Complaints raised directly with the Legal Ombudsman without going through the procedure described above will be referred to Stephen Thomas by the Ombudsman. Stephen Thomas will then attempt to deal with the matter as in point 4 in consultation with the appropriate member of staff.
9. The outcome of the complaint will be reported to the Legal Ombudsman.
10. At the conclusion of each complaint Stephen Thomas and the appropriate member of staff will review the cause of the complaint in order to try to prevent similar problems happening again.
The Legal Ombudsman may be contacted as follows:
PO Box 6167, Slough, SL1 0EH
Tel:03005550333
Email: enquiries@legalombudsman.org.uk
Website: https://www.legalombudsman.org.uk/contact-us/
Clients may have a right to object to their bills by making a complaint to the Legal Ombudsman and/or by applying to the court for an assessment of a bill under Part III of the Solicitors’ Act 1974. Please note the Legal Ombudsman may not consider a complaint about a bill if an application has been made to the court for assessment.
