Birchall Blackburn Law Arvostelua 

I was linked to BBL through a mortgage broker (Tembo) as I hoped for a quick and efficient wrap around service as I have very limited time. Tembo was great but the service I received from BBL was inefficient, slow, unprofessional and poor. This was a no chain purchase and delays felt unecessary and excessive.

There was virtually no personal contact and the majority of communication for the first few months was conducted through generic email addresses and I often waited days for limited, badly constructed responses. BBL operates its ID checks through a poorly functioning portal that no one at BBL can help with when it doesn't work. The other portal through which documents are provided set up a barrier between me and my conveyancer. Uploaded document titles often didn’t align with advisory letters and all letter were generic. Nothing was explained, never mind explained well.

Despite asking on various occasions, I received next to no feedback, on timelines or what to expect, which as a first time buyer was extremely frustrating - Google was more helpful. Questions often went unanswered, and I spent the equivalent of days doing research on my property purchasing queries. I feel like invoicing BBL for my time.

This review is not personal or specifically aimed at the people who served me - I sense staff are overwhelmed with too much work and deliberately distanced from clients through generic email addresses, apps and portals. I would not recommend BBL.

I cannot recommend Birchall Blackburn Law. My experience with them was the most stressful and disappointing property purchase I have faced in 30 years.

Excessive delays – The process dragged on for over 10 months for what should have been a straightforward residential leasehold purchase. This caused my mortgage offer to lapse, putting the entire transaction at risk.

Unnecessary and damaging enquiries – Instead of focusing on what mattered, my solicitor raised irrelevant questions (including suggesting it might be a “stressed sale”), which could easily have jeopardised the deal and pushed the seller to increase the price.

Lack of proactive case management – At no point did I feel my solicitor was steering the transaction efficiently. They failed to distinguish between critical and trivial issues, and did not take a pragmatic approach such as considering indemnity insurance. Instead of helping me progress, they created bottlenecks and stress.

Severe personal and financial impact – Because of their mishandling, I missed the SDLT reduction in April 2025, had to pay for unnecessary additional insurances, and faced huge disruption to my financial planning. For months, I had no certainty of completion, making it impossible to plan my move, works, or rentals.

Poor complaint handling – When I raised a formal complaint, I received dismissive responses which failed to engage with the substance of my concerns. I was essentially told their “final response” stood, leaving me no option but to escalate to the Legal Ombudsman.

I came to Birchall Blackburn on recommendation, expecting professionalism and a commercially minded service. Instead, I experienced delay, disorganisation, unnecessary stress, and a lack of accountability. I would strongly urge others to think very carefully before instructing this firm for conveyancing.

Excellent service again from Karen Williams and her team

They were efficient in all matters, responding promptly when needed.

We used BB Law recently for our house purchase after previously using them for our last sale which they made things really smooth and easy for us.

This time round though the solicitor was really attentive, every question we asked, queries we raised she got back to us really quickly. We’ve had solicitors in the past take days or even a week or 2 to get back to us but we had none of this, we usually had a response within the hour.

We don’t plan on moving anytime soon again but if we do we’ll use BB Law again and we’d recommend them to our friends, family and anyone who is reading this review.

We also found that they were one of the most reasonable quotes with no hidden extras.

Absolutely useless. Never answer their phone. Go else where if you actually want a service.

Just far too slow they changed my solicitor without notifying me and went way over the estimated cost,not very helpful with older people with dealing online, would have been nice with a bit of face to face contact.

Excellent service from Birchall Blackburn Law. Particular shout out to Amy & Ellen for all their hard work, keeping me updated throughout and providing clear advice.

I had just three weeks to complete my remortgage before my fixed rate ended — no chain, but a tight deadline. Once Sarah was allocated my case, she handled everything efficiently and diligently. No time was wasted, communication was clear, and the process moved smoothly from start to finish.

Thanks to her hard work, we completed on time and avoided any disruption to my mortgage. I’m so grateful for the support and wouldn’t hesitate to recommend the team at Birchall Blackburn.

I was thoroughly impressed with the excellent service provided by Nicholas Tyrer. Always super friendly, he ensured every issue was handled swiftly and effectively. I would highly recommend their services to anyone. Thank you for an excellent professional service.

High level of communication throughout from my solicitor Kieran. He helped guide me through the various final stages to sale completion. I had a very positive experience with Birchall Blackburn Law and would use you again for any future conveyancing services. I have used other firms for property in the past and BBL out performed my prior experiences with other firms.

Absolutely superb service from the conveyancing team. The efficiency, professionalism and swift communication made what could have been a very stressful experience, a smooth transaction. I cannot praise them highly enough. Particular praise to Kyle, solicitors assistant in the conveyancing team. His attention to detail is simply outstanding.
Very highly recommended for conveyancing transactions. Thank you.

Absolutely horrendous firm. Doesn’t even deserve 1 star. Please check the google reviews before you use this firm for the real picture.
We were no chain first time buyers, offer accepted in January and only picked up the keys at the start of July due to the delays and just awful service from this firm.
Lack of communication is shocking, the seller of our house actually threatened to pull out 4 times, and on the final time had told our solicitor they had a week to respond… they failed to inform us of this and we only found out as the seller was kind enough to message me directly!!
Demi does not answer the phone and instead chooses to email (but obviously will not respond to your emails). Charged us extra money to review ‘new’ documents I’d provided at the start. Miscalculated the final amount we had to pay on exchange, so risked delaying the whole thing again and even though it was their fault they had the audacity to make it our emergency to fix.
Birchall Blackburn ruined what should have been a really special and exciting time for us, instead making it 6 months of hell where every day we thought we were going to loose the house we fell in love with! Please save your sanity and use a different firm!!

We have used Birchall Blackburn 3 times now in 2011,2016,2025 to buy and sell houses. They are very competitve and we have always found them straightforward to deal with. Their portal makes convenyancing easy to deal with. Our conveyancer Rebecca was easy to contact and they got the job done with minimal effort.

Good experience start to finish, price was competitive and they were able to assist me in other legal areas such as a will and a declaration of trust. Kelly was very good. There were a few problems that arose from the searches last minute which were resolved quickly and the completion date was not affected.

Ben Wilde was amazing, he was always on the ball and was told he was the quickest and best Solictor out of our chain, he was so kind and would always be understanding

Janette Lawrence was dealing with my property purchase. I would like to tell Janette was spot-on in all areas of her work. Very quick and responsive in any kind of communications. Constant chasing up, to get the necessary documents from myself and the sellers solicitors. The same should be told about Sarah Howarth (from re-mortgaging perspective)as well. Well done team, I would surely recommend BBLaw for their professionalism.

We had an excellent experience with our house purchase. Communication was outstanding throughout the process — emails were always responded to on the same day, and everything was handled efficiently. We highly recommend their services!

Jane and Samiyah were great, very thorough and quick to respond to any queries, would definitely recommend.

We are cash buyers buying a rural property. This process has been like herding cattle through quicksand. The communication and understanding of what is required has been appalling. We are now having to split our sale and purchase due to how long they are taking and move into temp accomodation. 2 weeks before completion date for sale they have suddenly switched our 'Conveyancing Executive' NOT a solicitor by the way, just juniors dealing with stuff they don't understand - to a new person on a different site. Now, not even sure if the sale is going to happen. Reply to emails with vague - when I have read your file... WELL WHEN WILL THAT BE EXACTLY? They have asked our sellers loads of queries that either are irrelevant or have been answered in reports they have access to. They refuse to read the surveyors reports - require the sellers to specify everything even if it's irrelevant - but they don't know the property - they are a Trust. WE DON'T NEED A MORTGAGE which they didn't seem to understand until two weeks ago - but they still want every one of their queries answered and are holding up our move with spurious queries and will not meet to discuss which ones are important - will not filter them themselves. Now suddenly the whole purchase has been handed over to somebody else. We received a letter saying it will not hold anything up - but it already has. Tried to complain, don't answer phone - just transferred to answering phones. The previous conveyancing person went on maternity. YOU HAD PLENTY OF NOTICE THAT WAS GOING TO HAPPEN - WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL US? DO A PROPER HANDOVER?
We had used them 15 years ago, and they were fast and communicated well. Today they are nothing short of appalling.
Shout out to Kyle though who is good at his limited role I think.
UPDATE: The new conveyancer is actually a solicitor I think and is being helpful. However, a further point to add is that Birchall Blackburn have a portal for documents and actions to progress your sale, yet they don't use it consistently, only sometimes. Others, REALLY IMPORTANT ones like draft contracts and TR1 form sent on email with loads of other attachments in February - no action initiated on portal and then never chased with us. Suddenly right before our sale saying 'We're waiting for these docs we sent you by email in February.' Why didn't you send them using your own system? Then we would know there were outstanding actions to take. The portal says there are none. Why didn't you chase them even once? Obviusly we had missed them since we respond to everything really quickly, had responded to the other documents set with that email and you sent them in FEBRUARY. It's halfway through July.