Countrywide Conveyancing Services Reviews 287

Would be 0 star if I could, choosing to go with countrywides conveyancing service to make the move easier and stress free couldn’t have been further from reality. Poor communication, no follow up, emails from different people every time and solicitors who mislead and are caught out actually lying about enquiries. If you are undecided on whether to use them please think again, I’m 6 months into the process and the incompetence is just getting worse

My experience with this company was shocking. They sent a surveyor named Dalbir Basi, who spent barely three minutes at my property before leaving. The report he produced undervalued my home by almost £100,000, which caused major issues with my mortgage.

When another lender sent a different surveyor, the same property was valued £35,000 higher, proving how inaccurate Countrywide’s valuation was.
These surveyors do not appear to act independently, they seem to work more for the lender than for the customer, which makes the whole process feel biased and unfair.
If I had known how they operate, I would never have let them through the door. Completely unprofessional and a waste of money. Find an independent surveyor who actually takes the time to inspect your home properly.

Appalling! Used them ourselves once in the past. This time our buyers used them and the service was even worse. The client speaks to a case handler who then refers each step to the qualified solicitor when they get around to reviewing their numerous cases. Client almost never speaks to solicitor so no way to speed things up or get professional opinions on tricky issues. Delay is built into the system.
We saved ourselves huge stress by appointing a solicitor direct and getting personal advice from them at all stages. Our buyers' inexperience and choice of Countrywide brought us to within a day of the whole chain collapsing. Nightmare!!

An absolute omnishambles of an organisation.

This company couldn't organise a pissup in a brewery even if it was organised for them. Huge delays to the point that as sellers we almost lost our mortgage offer, even further delays at completion causing us issues where we were unable to get in the house until more than 3 hours after the contract states.

Avoid like the plague if you actually ever want to buy or sell.

My landlord is remortgaging and arranged an appointment. She asked them not to call me until she'd had chance to speak to me first and explain the situation. They ignored her and phoned me at 7:50AM in the morning! This is unacceptable, for one it panicked me that she was selling the house (she isn't). Also, contact before 9AM is ridiculous. What a stupid way to run a business!

AVOID. I am a landlord and will be removing my properties from them. I currently have 3 complaints in about a deposit that I’m entitled to but that I have not recieved! Rude staff member who doesn’t respond to emails. I have had enough and will not be renewing any contracts with them. I note their terrible reviews that have been left by other customers and am completely unsurprised that people are unhappy. Awful company.

Bad experience, don’t go near. For two years of completion, till today my name is not on the register!

I had the misfortune of being assigned Latham Gadd as my conveyancing solicitor - a person who, to this day, I'm not convinced actually exists as he was so elusive to contact.

Latham regularly took a minimum of one week to reply to emails. Even if it was to check I'd signed a document in the correct place before posting - surely a one second job to open a PDF and reply yes/no.

There were times when I did not hear from Latham at all for three weeks and even four weeks on one occasion.

I began to be seriously concerned that there was a problem with my emails, that Latham was sick, or that he'd been given the sack. I called up the office regularly throughout the six month process and only successfully got a hold of him once. On other occasions, I asked for a call back and never received one.

When I brought up these communication problems with his line manager, she replied, "Well, I can ask him to reply to you but obviously I can't make him do anything." Who can then?

I asked if there was a communication policy, e.g. a minimum number of working days in which a solicitor should reply to their client. The call centre staff said this didn't exist. I asked if they thought a week was acceptable - they said no. How about a month? Also not acceptable, yet it happened with regularity with Latham Gadd.

The reason why this review is 2 stars is because Latham went on holiday at the end of the process. We were then appointed Mary Lord who had good communication and got us over the line. I was so thankful not to have Latham at the end or we'd probably still be waiting on a reply right now.

This shows Countrywide is luck of the draw. You might get someone decent, or you might get Latham. Either way, the company needs to put in place a clear communication policy and line managers ought to take responsibility for whipping their team into shape - isn't that what their role is meant to be?

Overall, disappointing and frustrating. I can't believe that professionals can ignore clients for a month despite repeated follow-ups. In no other industry would this be acceptable.

I was advised to go with countrywide conveyancing by our estate agent and told because they are within the same company any issues could be ironed out quickly.... i lasted 2 weeks with countrywide conveyancing before switching to another solicitors as the service i got in that time was just atrocious.
They say they are 7 days a week but this isnt 100% correct. yes you can contact a call centre and leave messages but your actual legal rep still only works 9-5 Mon to Fri. I was never able to speak to my legal rep, i would email, call and leave messages but they never came back to me at all.
When i received paperwork relating to our purchase the address was incorrect and when i raised this i was told to sign it anyway and they would amend .. i dont think so !!! i am not signing incorrect legal documents.
Another selling point is they have an online portal where you can keep check of your case, however this is never kept up to date and does not reflect the actual status.
You are constantly having to scan documents and upload them which is not an easy process and always having to verify your identity and upload p[passport details.
like i said in the end we swapped to a local solicitor where we could go and physically speak to them and take documents to them as i could foresee real issues with countrywide when it came to the nitty gritty of selling and buying that needs your legal rep to be on the ball and chasing vendors and buyers.
I am so glad i did and honestly would never ever recommend their service to anyone.

AVOID Honestly go with an independent local solicitor. Purchasers used this company as recommended by the Estate Agents - they were absolutely awful!
Took 6 months with no chain as we were selling empty property. They kept asking for the same documents with our solicitors stating they were totally incompetent! No one person to discuss with. It got to the point where we said if not exchanged by x date we were going to pull out as so frustrated with them.

I’m not even a customer but did ask for a quote from these people from my Estate Agent. No quote was received but emails welcoming me as a customer, a link to a portal…and now a demand for payment!
I wrote to them telling I was not using them, I complained to the agent but jumped on here to say - do not ever consider them, or provide your details to them. I consider I’ve dodged a bullet - I can’t imagine how incompetent they would go on to be, but don’t engage or consider at all.

Amanda was absolutely incredible! Always available to support all of our needs, and made our case feel important and valued. There was nothing that we couldnt ask for Amanda's support with, and the entire process would have seem unachievable without her outstanding support!

Terrible company to use. The company is not following the tenancy agreement. They're breaking the law by misleading people. That company is very chaotic, and they know nothing about the service their are providing. The staff is always changing and new people coming to assess the property without any knowledge about previous propety situation. If you are brave enough, you can use their services, but do not count to have your deposit back. I'm very sorry to say that, but the way I was treated is unacceptable. I'm very disappointed as I thought that the company is more efficient. I'm really surprised that this company is still on the market. Who is the regulatory body to protect the tenants rights? Any clues?

I had Countrywide perform a level 2 Survey on a flat I am purchasing. I specifically chose Countryside for this as they offer valuations alongside the survey.

I was asked what amount I was purchasing the flat for when I requested the survey, which I thought was a bit strange, so I listed an incorrect figure much higher than the actual purchase price.

When the survey report came back, it was very clearly just a big template with a bunch of non-property specific text, with some extremely basic observations on the property in a couple of sections. These sections referred multiple times to a valuation, but there was no valuation given.

I complained, asking for at least a valuation, and eventually I was sent an "amended report" that now has a valuation section - the valuation was EXACTLY the same number as the incorrect figure I had put in their website, with no explanation of how they arrived at the figure.

I have raised issue with this, but they have refused to explain further, or give me even a partial refund.

If you want value for money, and anything more than a copy and paste job with a few comments like "the walls are made of stone", do not choose Countryside.

Beware of these also known as Gilson Gray of Lincoln....absolutely the worse conveyancing solicitor around..they were not ours but our solicitor could never get in contact with them.....after 6 months they hadn't done thier job properly forcing us to withdraw from the sale with no end in sight.....and they haven't had the decency to tell thier client...disgusting service and the manager never responded to complaints from our solicitors.
Avoid Avoid Avoid!!!!!!!

Both sets of conveyances ours who were the buyers, and the sellers solicitors were a problem.
However, things were made worse as Countrywide were difficult to get hold of. Told us to ring them, then the number just disconnected and did not answer messages. We had to escalate to head office via FB to get a contact method. Then we had to check absolutely every detail as countrywide continuously made mistakes about the flat we were purchasing. Solicitors do not seem to understand there is a reason they should do things, such as make sure the registration document is accurate. Getting information is just a tick in the box and they do not bother to read or understand or advise on them. However, after a lot of angry words about lack of progress which to be fair was mostly caused by the sellers solicitor countrywide did take action. My thoughts in general is that using conveyancing services artifically extends the buying and selling process, causes inaccuracies which could end up in problems, and costs you a lot of money for very poor services. We will do our own conveyancing next time as it is only an admin job.

I've only been with this solicitor for 2 weeks and I'm already getting annoyed. First of all, they require me to PRINT OUT a document, sign it, scan it, and send it to them... In this day and age we should have the ability to be doing these things digitally. It's honestly a joke that we are still having to use prehistoric techniques to do things nowadays.

I also got told to return the "contents checklist" which was sent out to me in September last year?? I've only been a client for 2 weeks! How can I have these sent out to me LAST YEAR?? I have been told that I'll be emailed these, but here I am after a week and 4 phone calls complaining that I haven't received them and I STILL haven't received them!

Honestly a joke of a company. I cannot wait to move away.

i knew i was going to have issues when this company was appointed to value my home for the buyer from reading the reviews on here
£17150 under market value i don't think so, please beware of this company
they were very pushy and the person i dealt with wasn't a nice man either and i wouldn't let them in my house again even if it meant losing a sale

After 1 month with this atrocious company that we were referred to by our estate agents we realised despite all our chasing and paying money over, absolutely nothing had been done by the company. We fortunately decided to cut our losses and change solicitors, by 4pm the day we instructed the new solicitors we were already further along than we ever got in a month with countrywide. I’ve never come across such an incompetent company, absolutely useless and a complete waste of time. The only positive is we received all our money back with no problems, that can warrant the one star rating! Even if you have started the process with them you will be better off switching to another company.

I am putting a property on the market with Bairstow Eves and even before it has been viewed Countrywide are hounding me to take it's services and pay fees. Charlotte Richards of Gilson Gray in Lincoln in this instance. ARE YOU DESPERATE FOR CUSTOM!