{
  "url": "https://openlegislation.uk/legal-profession-and-legal-aid-scotland-act-2007/section-34",
  "json_url": "https://openlegislation.uk/legal-profession-and-legal-aid-scotland-act-2007/section-34.json",
  "legislation": "asp/2007/5",
  "legislation_title": "Legal Profession and Legal Aid (Scotland) Act 2007",
  "legislation_url": "https://openlegislation.uk/legal-profession-and-legal-aid-scotland-act-2007",
  "path": "section/34",
  "kind": "section",
  "number": "34",
  "heading": "Commission's duty to provide advice",
  "text": "(1) The Commission must, so far as is reasonably practicable, provide advice to any person who requests it as respects the process of making a services complaint or a handling complaint to it.\n(2) Where the Commission receives a complaint suggesting what purports to be professional misconduct or unsatisfactory professional conduct by a practitioner who is a firm of solicitors or an incorporated practice—\n(a) it must inform the person that a complaint to it suggesting such misconduct or such conduct may be made only against a named practitioner who is an individual;\n(b) where the complaint received is not about a named practitioner who is an individual, it must so far as is reasonably practicable offer advice to the person with a view to assisting the person to reformulate the complaint so that it is about such a named practitioner.\n(3) Where a person in requesting or being offered such advice expresses a preference for receiving it by a particular means (as, for example, in writing, by telephone, by means of a recording or an explanation in person), the Commission must, so far as is reasonably practicable, give effect to the preference.",
  "extent": null,
  "status": null,
  "version": "current",
  "annotations": [],
  "outstanding_effects": [
    {
      "type": "words repealed",
      "affecting": "asp/2025/8",
      "affecting_title": "Regulation of Legal Services (Scotland) Act 2025"
    },
    {
      "type": "words substituted",
      "affecting": "asp/2025/8",
      "affecting_title": "Regulation of Legal Services (Scotland) Act 2025"
    }
  ],
  "provenance": {
    "source": "legislation.gov.uk",
    "source_url": "https://www.legislation.gov.uk/asp/2007/5/section/34",
    "retrieved_at": "2026-10-29T20:16:01.165335+00:00"
  },
  "licence": "Open Government Licence v3.0",
  "licence_url": "https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/",
  "attribution": "Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Source: legislation.gov.uk, The National Archives."
}