Hi OzLegal,
A mid-tier commercial law firm has been acting for me on a litigation matter over the last 6 months.
In the beginning, they made some effort to understand and take on the case - all seemed well with regular communication and updates.
But more recently, (last~8 weeks), they've gone radio silent. No response to emails and not returning my calls. I know they're busy but this is pathetic.
Where do I go to make a complaint? Is this a common occurence in the legal industry? Any other advice on how to resolve this?
I've paid ~$5,000 in fees but they've only done the ground work with no resolution.
Please note: OzBargain is currently under legal threat from an unrelated solicitor firm, from a forum post similar to this. Just to be safe, moderators have decided to edit out the name of the company in this post for now. Please be considerate when you post comments.
The Google review one?
Please don't mention them unnecessarily either, as it will complicate matters.
If you guys need funding there should be a heaps of users who will help out based on the number of posts in "THE" thread….. I was one of them and will donate if OZB needs to hire a solicitor.
@AndyC1: I'd be happy to contribute as well.
@brendanm: I don't have much money, but I will also support Ozb.
@BewareOfThe Dog: I'm gonna put my monthly eneloop allowance towards it!
@moar bargains: Why don't you just donate Eneloops instead?
@AndyC1: I can understand that they feel better off avoiding complicating things, as being sued is a huge headache even if it doesn’t cost you money and you win, it’s still a bunch of time and stress. Do not recommend.
@[Deactivated]: This. I'm sure ozbargain can come up with the money to defend, but its just a waste of time and time is more expensive than money.
@[Deactivated]: I’m sure all the people egging that person on to fight it will be happy to contribute to the costs of fighting it (probably to the tune of hundreds of $$$).
But my guess is they won’t.
Exact reason I chose not to name the insurer I had the issue with.
@AndyC1: Me too
@AndyC1: Yeah. But it is only a 'should'
The solution isn't legal, anyhow.
B I K I E S!
@resisting the urge: Crowd funding is legal.
@resisting the urge: @AndyC1; for the moment it is
I can close some of my eth's short position & support scotty
@frewer:
Heresy
@brendanm: What heresy?
wow … please yes somehow keep the community updated on this - this is just wrong, what has The Internet come to :(
PS goes without saying that I and I am sure many many others will support OzB with whatever they can
how come i can't upvote moderator comments?
All those negative reviews have been scrubbed, and there are a huge number of 5 star reviews in the last 3 days (all with 2 or 3 thumbsup each).
It's clear what that means.
Abhorrent behaviour by that company. Those are all obviously FAKE reviews
I recently put a negative Google review about a company I used for work on my house. Was immediately threatened with defamation so removed it as I don't need the hassle.
Completely undermined any trust might have had in the Google review system. Seems you can't even post an honest opinion any more.
@Brianqpr: Maybe I should delete all my Google reviews?
They don't benefit me after all.
Did they threaten you via a reply to the google review?
@idonotknowwhy: No it was by email. I had complained to them directly and basically been told to f**k off, so put up a negative review. Had a reply within a few mins saying they'd handed it over to their lawyers. Not a high volume business so wasn't hard for them to work out the review was by me.
@Brianqpr: Wait… how? Unless you have your full name and address in your Google bio for all to see - how do they even identify you?
@Brianqpr: create a new google account, unrelated to you in name, and then review it again.
I saw when they were all posted. Quite funny when a bunch of 5 star reviews popped up and they were all 16 hours ago 😂
@Emphasise: Curious, can you report them to google for fake reviews?
@Name: It would probably be pretty hard to prove.
@Name: Would be a paid service which google secretly own anyway.
@Emphasise: Can you please DM me their name? Curious. Sorry, I missed the other thread.
No wonder Lawyers are scum. They will use scare tactics to get their way.
Could you please let me know of the company in pm?
@CocaKoala: DM me too pl0x
@capslock janitor: pm me the company too please
@zorodluffy: Me four, cheers!
@Kangal: Me Five please
@idonotknowwhy: ME six plzz!
@zorodluffy: Can you change your settings to be able to accept PMs please - am trying to send you a DM
@inasero: its all good, i figured i can see the company name by checking the revisions
😂
link?
Dm'd
Can a forum be legally accountable for a posters content on it that doesn't break the law? Crazy.
Perhaps we need a section 230 equivalent :)
Forum comments can be considered "published" content: https://www.itlawyer.com.au/atl-blog/16/9/2021/high-court-ho…
Yes, the Voller case demonstrated that forums or social media need to moderate user-generated comments, which we have always done — to the point that we are getting so many 1-star reviews from banned users saying we are over-moderating…
@scotty:
Guess you know who to call if you want to get them taken down…
@scotty: Had a quick glance of these reviews.
Surely, those reviewers confused OzBargain with the Australian subreddits.
I believe the OzBargain forums's biggest issue is users just posting up straight-up nonsense. But even then, I don't find many of such posts here politically toxic. It's just literal nonsense often by new accounts and with no responses to their original post.
@tallkid123: There's probably a lot of small business' selling $2 aliexpress crap for $20, then getting all pissy when called out for it.
@scotty: lol, "OzBargain is Worst Website Ever in History"
"Mod's will ban you on a whim". Can't imagine what awful BS they were posting considering some of the stuff I see posted here by people who aren't banned.
Whirlpool has fought off similar scumbags before.
Why don't we have something like this ,too?
https://whirlpool.net.au/wiki/wp_defamation
Anyway can sue anything about anything if they're dedicated and get some lawyers to make a case out of it.
You should check out Netflix's, The Most Hated Man on the Internet. Gives you a good eye opener into why forums and websites cannot turn a blind eye or be allowed to indemnify themselves from content they are hosting. Unfortunately in circumstances such as the one mentioned in this thread the poor website gets caught inbetween. But still, that's the law for you.
Wow so they’re actually threatening you now.
If it gets to the point where you are going to court I’ll happily donate to a gofundme (like what Crikey has done against Lachlan Murdoch).
People who bully others are trash humans and deserve to be put in their place.
Lawyers need to tone down the butthurt
You can still see the name in the revisions, but I guess it won't come up in Google searches
Honestly I agree with freedom of speech and all that but posts like this are often frivolous and extremely anectodal and only go to cause ozbargain issues.
Very often lawyers or even doctors will just not say much to the client or just ignore as sometimes the problem itself IS the client.
If there isn't any substance provided in the post I'm not sure how people can help as I assume it will be hard for OP to provide specific details of any case, IF there is one.
Googling 'where can I complain about a lawyer'
take you right here as the first search…
How to lodge a complaint | VLSBC - Legal Services Boardhttps://www.lsbc.vic.gov.au › consumers › how-lodge-c…
19 Jan 2022 — Step 1: start by getting in touch with your lawyer first · Step 2: make sure your complaint is one we can handle · Step 3: share your concerns …
Are we in Australia? or North Korea? Whatever happened to freedom of speech. How's anything defamation, if it's the truth.
The commonwealth has never had such a thing as Freedom of speech. We're just fortunate enough that the ideals of democracy propagate down through policy and the people, and result in LESS censorship than North Korea or China.
There is still some censorship however
It is not entirely correct to say Australia doesn't have some form of guaranteed "freedom of expression". Although there's no Australian equivalent of a US style "Bill of Rights", the High Court of Australia has made it very clear that the Australian Constitution has an "implied freedom of political communication". Basically it just means people can talk about politics freely. It is an "implied freedom" because the Constitution never actually said this, but the HCA has interpreted the Constitution in such a way that, for the prescribed democratic form of government to work and for people to vote, such a freedom must necessarily be "implied".
So yes, there's SOME guaranteed freedom, but it's rather limited, and not expressly laid out. In theory the High Court could re-interpret this but in reality it's not really likely, given it's very much entrenched law by this point. But who knows, Roe v Wade was also entrenched law in the US before it was overturned by the US Supreme Court.
@xiabonan: Thanks for the history lesson. I've never heard it explained in this much detail to me before lol
We've never been entitled to FOS in Australia, just popular speech + popular acceptance of some dissenting speech
While I do not believe this to be true, one of the common argument to push for defamation is that it protects the integrity of freedom of speech, so that the ones who voice their opinions for legitimate reasons should not be grouped together with those using it for hate/discriminatory/vexatious reasons. That is why defamation law suits are so common in the so-called land of the free, the US.
Also this doesnt matter because theres nothing about right or freedom of speech in our constituion. Only an implied freedom of some sort that requires you to interpret the letters in a very arguable manner.
Don't back down. Hate seeing these companies bulldoze those into submission.
This is a free country with right to freedom of speech and expression. More power to OzB and more power to those who stand against atrocities.
The law firm is claiming they were defamed by the publisher "Ozbargain". Unfortunatel/fortunately, that is also a very strongly protected legal right. Many online publishers have lost, all the way up to the High Court.
In a similar story, Google (Youtube) was forced to pay out $715,000 to NSW politician John Barilaro this year for similar claims. Legal costs were estimated to be closer to $100k.
Unfortunately not for us.
US has free speech because of the first amendment, we do not.
First Amendment applies within political context only. You can criticize the government without retribution from government.
Anything outside this, there's no protection, just like the Amber Heard case.
There's no such right, it's not explicitly written in our Australian Constitution.
It irks me greatly when Australians tout the "free speech" crap. You watch too much USA TV.
I'm really curious, who try to threaten ozbargain? Can some kind soul plz pm me the details
Me too.
Has there been an update on this? Is OzB still under legal threat?
See summary under our Merchant Takedown Request thread. Haven't heard from them since early this month, after our lawyer replied to their request.
I did not know this thread existed, thank you!
Upon reading, running a forum sounds a lot more stressful than I thought… Big love to the OzB team 🧡