Last minute delay for completion nightmare

[wishIwasonholiday10]

We are supposed to be completing today but our lawyers IT system is completely down and they have been unable to transfer the money. Has anyone experienced something similar and what happened next? Our sellers just rung us panicking as they have had all their stuff packed up and we have loads to deliveries booked to the new house tomorrow (whiteware, furniture etc). We are bottom of the chain - will be liable for everyone’s costs even if it’s our lawyers fault?

Oh dear, I hope you get this resolved soon!

Having done three lots of conveyancing in two years with a more traditional paper-based firm and an online conveyancer, I can see why there are so many of the online firms now. Paper storage is expensive and fairly inefficient/inconvenient - our traditional firm was lovely with great staff but it did involve waiting for things to come in the post, driving stuff to the solicitor late at night when there was a postal strike, having to email or phone for updates and it cost a lot more than the online only conveyancer. Whereas the online one was good, efficient and used an online portal to quickly upload documents too.

Of course, that one would be very vulnerable to a cyber attack though!

OP I'm impressed you're not having a full on breakdown. £4.5k!

I suppose after the nightmare is over, you can try this route?
https://www.sra.org.uk/consumers/problems/

But if there's nothing in place to cover consumers, that's genuinely shocking....

There was a similar incident in 2021, so there's precedent.

@RidingMyBike I've done similar, traditional firm was better as everything went by email where possible but there was always paper back up. More expensive though.

I suppose this will be ripe territory for yet more indemnity insurance firms.

It looks like we're going to be affected by this too.
We have already exchanged and are due to complete on Thursday but my buyer has messaged me to say that their solicitor has been in touch to say there may be a delay due to their IT systems being affected.
We're in a chain of about 5/6 so its a huge worry. We also have removals booked and paid for and (almost) everything packed, pets are booked in with a sitter too. I'm mostly worried about anyone trying to claim compensation if we can't complete. My buyers are the bottom of the chain.
I've emailed my solicitor but haven't received a response.
Apparently we'll know more on Monday.
Fingers crossed it all gets sorted for everyone.

If you are on Facebook, there's apparently a section called "when conveyancing goes rogue"

maybe they can advise? It's a private thing so I can't see it.

I’m sure your lawyer will be devastated by this too and will be doing whatever they can - it isn’t their fault - there are people working night and day to fix it - it will be resolved #bekind - blame the cyber criminals

@Kindnesscostsnothing23 you'd think the industry would have contingency plans though

people in tech suggesting that it is possible to have that. Compulsory paper back from the day of exchange would work.

I shudder to think what will happen when banks go down.

Hi i understand your frustration and hope you got sorted. Speaking from the other side and as one of those firms affected we cant just send out money to a firm who may have sent us bank details by email 2 weeks ago. Imagine if we didnt complete the appropriate check and just sent out your money willy nilly! Who are you going to blame for your purchase money going to a scammer because you insisted on it being sent? Ive got a good idea who 🫤. Trust me this has been a nightmare for us and has contributed to a lot of stress and tears from our side as well. We have protocols we have to follow and if we cant do the appropriate checks it is virtually impossible. Our firm could be shut down if we just start sending money out left right and centre

I am affected by this too. What’s very frustrating is a similar thing happened to the industry in 2021 and yet nothing has been out in place after that to address any of the issues!!!

The property process is so so stressful and something like this would have tipped me over the edge so massive sympathy to all of you caught up in this! Hope it's fixed ASAP 🙏

I was chatting to someone who works in a conveyancing practice affected by this. Said it was the most stressful week ever as everyone affected is contacting them, but there's nothing they can do. One of the practice partners was supposed to be completing on sale and purchase themselves and couldn't yesterday. Also, a lot of staff are incentivised and have targets to meet. They'll have missed those for November meaning their pay is impacted. It's really bad the provider has been hacked and I wouldn't like to be them!

You don't know this and it is unlikely to be an identical attack. It's clearly a risk and to happen twice in a couple of years is very worrying.

Just to add, I’m not blaming the individual solicitors or practices, but it’s not clear on what happens if we can’t complete.
Do we then have to pay the deposit as compensation to our sellers? As I understand it this could be the case, if isn’t then
then some reassurance would be most welcome.

There should be a clause in the exchange contract that states you can’t be held liable if the completion can’t go ahead for reasons beyond your control.

That’s my main worry, the rest is stressful and annoying but we can get over a delay and living out of boxes for a while.

I don’t think anyone is expecting money to be sent out “willy nilly” but it’s not unreasonable to expect there to be emergency processes in place.

I used to work as a manager in finance and we were required to have BCP plans for every eventuality. That included everything from a fire or a physical attack on the building right through to hackers and tech loss.

We were required to have emergency plans by our regulator. Is that not the case here?!

I think what’s frustrating people now is that despite the very well-known risks of hacking, there doesn’t appear to have been any contingency planning.

Do these conveyancers not have any emergency planning? Loss of access to systems is a fairly basic emergency situation and it’s entirely reasonable to expect there to be back-up plans for loss of tech access….

I do understand it must be absolutely rotten working for a company that’s affected but what does your emergency planning document say? There should be emergency protocols that have been tested and can just swing into action.

Spiders "I do understand it must be absolutely rotten working for a company that’s affected but what does your emergency planning document say? There should be emergency protocols that have been tested and can just swing into action."

exactly this.

and AFAICS nothing has been put in place after 2021 - parliament have said that it's on their list of things that need to be addressed. But we've really got to ask how we got here in the first place.

Has anyone had any updates as to whether this has been fixed or are we all still in the dark?😣

They will have business continuity plans and will be doing as much as they can. They are heavily regulated and have to manage risk.

The CTS website contains information on the latest update although there is still not enough detail. Stay positive and let’s hope this is resolved as quickly as possible for all.

How did it used to work before the internet? House completions went through in the 1990s (not hundreds of years ago) OK. All companies should have contingencies in place to deal with system failures.

I’m also affected by this! Was supposed to exchange on Thursday for completion on Friday 1st December. It’s only 2 of us in the chain so I’m really hoping this gets sorted. We really need to move on Friday 😬

If any conveyancers on here have any updates, please give us some reassurance!!

My understanding is that this won't stop transactions fro happening, but they won't happen in the dates planned. The conveyancers will compensate affected customers.

I have had my hands burned on completion day before. Human error rather than IT. Eventually completed at 6pm. Id been paying the removal firm by the hour to sit on their hands till then. Too late at that point to do the move. It can happen. If I'm not selling and can avoid moving in on completion day but schedule for the next day then I would.

Also affected by this. Feel absolutely sick as my mortgage offer expires in a couple of weeks. Surely they must have a back up system for if their IT systems crash, I refuse to believe they don’t

Because they don’t have an individual client account for each transaction

The bank can tell them how much money is in the client account (which will be in the name of the solicitors) they don’t have any record of how much of that money belongs to @wishIwasonholiday10 .

Without access to their files, the law firm can’t legally be sure the money is there to send - and it’s a very serious matter to spend money in the client account on anything other than the transaction of the person who sent it to the solicitors. It’s held on trust for an individual client and the solicitors / conveyancers have to prove they only spent it for that client and that they made proper checks before doing so.

Crabbies so does that mean the reference numbers attached to client money are not visible at present?

@wishIwasonholiday10, if you have exchanged with a completion date set, the contract is between you and the sellers and you are liable. However you then have a contract with the conveyancers and they are liable to you.

Since there is a chain, each person will claim against the person below them in the chain for all costs so:

@wishIwasonholiday10 buys from the Greens who buy from the Purples who buy from the Pinks

The Pinks claim all costs of their delay from the Purples who then claim their costs plus that of the Pinks from the Greens who then claim 3 lots of costs from @wishIwasonholiday10.

She will then need to claim from the conveyancers who she has a contract with.

If everyone is reasonable, no one will need to sue because each level will accept liability and pay up.

The conveyancers may then go after the IT company.

They may be but in a lot of firms, the client reference isn’t ’John and Anne Smith’, it’s a random string of numbers (for data protection). It may be a different string of numbers for each transaction on one purchase / sale (not usually an issue as each reference is recorded on the client file).

If they can’t access the master list (if they have one - they may just record the information on the client files) they will have to try and match references from elsewhere (maybe correspondence?) and even then, I’m not sure they’d be allowed to do that because they can’t confirm the reference numbers they have obtained are accurate. If they even exist - it may be the only place the information is recorded is the client file.

Bear in mind that in a big conveyancing firm, there are probably multi millions in the client account and thousands of transactions each day.

Also, due to transfer limits, one client may have 3 or 4 transactions that need tracking down for the deposit plus the mortgage transfer. Now multiply that (in a big firm) via several hundred or thousand clients.

It can be done and will be if the systems stay down but it is neither quick nor easy.