A few thoughts on... why bigger conveyancing firms can still provide a personal service

Can a larger conveyancing firm provide an efficient service without losing the personal touch? I believe it can. Size and technology do not decide whether clients feel looked after. People, culture and priorities do.

In brief: A larger conveyancing firm can provide a personal service when clients have a named lawyer, teams are properly trained and supported, and technology is used to improve communication and efficiency rather than replace human contact.

Sitting on our Marketing and Business Development sub-committee is one of the various hats I wear in my role as Managing Partner.

Marketing is an area I have been interested in since GCSE Business Studies, believe it or not, and I enjoy working closely with our excellent marketing professionals.

In that context, I recently carried out a little reputation checking on Martin Tolhurst Solicitors using a couple of popular generative AI tools. I was pleased by some of what came back, but one particular assumption made me stop and think.

What does ‘volume conveyancer’ actually mean?

For anyone unfamiliar with Martin Tolhurst, we have a strong local reputation across Kent, particularly for residential conveyancing.

When the firm’s name comes up in conversation, many Kent residents will have used us when buying or selling a property, or will know somebody who has.

We are one of the larger conveyancing firms in the county by transaction volume, with a significant proportion of our colleagues working in residential conveyancing.

Some people may therefore describe us as ‘volume conveyancers’.

At its simplest, that description is accurate. We undertake a high volume of conveyancing transactions. However, the term is also sometimes used negatively, as though the number of transactions a firm handles automatically tells you something about the quality or personal nature of its service.

It does not.

Can a larger conveyancing firm still offer a personal service?

Anyone who spends much time on LinkedIn will probably be familiar with the ongoing debate about the conveyancing profession and the home-moving process.

Conveyancers of every type can be easy targets for criticism, and larger firms often find themselves near the front of the queue.

When I asked some of my favourite AI tools which firms they might recommend for conveyancing in Kent, I was pleased to see that Martin Tolhurst was one of the names regularly highlighted.

The reasoning behind those recommendations included our efficiency, technology-led approach, instant online quoting and case-tracking tools.

One tool described us as being ‘built for speed and volume’. So far, so good. Although I may have been stretching the truth slightly when I referred to all of them as my ‘favourite’ AI tools.

The part I found less convincing came when I asked for more detail. I was informed that somebody looking for a personal service might be better choosing a smaller firm.

That raised a much more interesting question: why should efficiency and scale be treated as the opposite of personal service?

My answer is that they should not be.

Is the assumption about larger firms justified?

Before going any further, I am well aware that the quality of an AI response depends heavily on the way a question is asked.

As I have said on several occasions recently, one of the limitations of casual AI use is that it is often possible to frame a question in a way that encourages the tool to agree with the point you were already trying to make.

Nevertheless, the response appeared to reflect a wider assumption that many consumers may share: the larger a business becomes, the less likely it is to provide a personal service.

That is where the logic starts to fall apart for me.

Like everyone else, I am also a consumer. I deal with businesses every day, both professionally and personally. I have received excellent service on many occasions and, on almost as many, frankly awful service.

The poor experiences have come from businesses of every kind: small businesses, large businesses, local businesses and national organisations.

Size alone has not determined whether I received good service.

Size does not decide service quality

Banks provide a useful example.

By their nature, banks are large organisations handling enormous volumes of transactions, account openings and customer requests.

On more than one occasion, I have ended a call with a bank needing to resist the urge to launch my telephone into the wall and flip my desk.

I have also experienced quite the opposite: a professional, efficient and genuinely personable service from an institution of a similar size.

The difference between those experiences was not the size of the businesses. Both were huge.

The difference was that one organisation had clearly chosen to make service a priority, while the other appeared to treat it as an afterthought.

The positive experience came from a business that seemed to have created a genuine service culture, with the customer placed at the heart of what it did.

Training, systems, support, management and leadership will all have played a part in creating that culture. Of course, all of that hard work can still be undone by a single poor customer experience.

What makes a conveyancing service feel personal?

The same principles apply to conveyancing.

If a firm, its leaders and its people are genuinely focused on achieving the right outcome for the client, the number of transactions it handles is not the deciding factor.

What matters is whether the firm provides:

• a named professional with responsibility for the client’s matter;
• experienced and well-trained people;
• sufficient resources and knowledgeable support;
• clear and timely communication;
• robust systems and strong organisation; and
• a genuine commitment to continuous improvement.

These are the elements that help clients feel supported and looked after throughout their property transaction.

They are not dependent on the firm being small.

How can technology make conveyancing more human?

Technology also has an important role in modern conveyancing. That may include online quotations, case tracking, automation, AI and other digital tools.

However, the purpose of technology should be to help people provide a better service, not simply to remove people from the process.

At Martin Tolhurst, our clients have a named lawyer responsible for their case, supported by knowledgeable teams who understand the transaction.

We use technology to help keep matters moving, make information more accessible and enable our people to work more productively and efficiently.

Used properly, technology gives people more time to concentrate on the parts of the job that it cannot easily replicate: listening, explaining, reassuring and helping clients through what can be a stressful process.

Technology should make our people more available to clients, not less.

Personal service requires continuous improvement

I am certainly not claiming to run a perfect business.

Creating and maintaining a culture of good service is something we work extremely hard at within Martin Tolhurst. That does not mean we can become complacent or assume that we get everything right on every occasion.

Providing a consistently high standard of service requires continued attention, investment and a willingness to improve.

Great service today also looks very different from great service ten years ago. It is dramatically different from what it would have looked like when Martin Tolhurst was founded in the 19th century.

What has remained constant is the need to understand and respond to the people who trust us with what is, for many, their most important investment: their home.

For us, personal service does not mean avoiding technology or placing an artificial limit on the number of clients we can help.

It means combining capable people, knowledgeable teams and effective systems so that every client feels that somebody is looking after them.

We also train continuously, not only our lawyers but colleagues throughout our teams. The objective is simple: if we are good today, we want to be better tomorrow.

Bigger does not have to mean less personal

What I took from my slightly bruising conversation with AI was not necessarily that it had misunderstood Martin Tolhurst.

It was that the assumption itself was worth challenging.

Bigger does not have to mean less personal, just as technology does not have to mean less human. Ultimately, those are choices that businesses make.

For us, the challenge is to keep growing, keep improving and continue making intelligent use of technology, without ever forgetting that on the other side of every property transaction is a person who simply wants to feel that somebody is looking after them.

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