Keystone Law Reviews 

Annabel Clark was outstanding. We went to her aghast at the standard of the English legal profession. Our experience with Paul Robinson Solicitors was disappointing. It was even worse with Wright Hassall who were argumentative, slow, confused a joint tenancy with a tenancy in common, failed to follow instructions and failed to properly advise my mother, their 90+ year old client. In contrast Annabel was responsive, proactive, respectful to my mother and above all totally professional. She was calm and sensible in her dealings with a rude and aggressive lawyer on the other side. She instructed counsel at exactly the right time and on the right points. Our aim was to ensure that my mother would have sufficient funds to live on for the rest of her life. Thanks to Annabel’s advice we were able to achieve our objective and conclude the matter with a court approved settlement following mediation. This review is by M Janki for an English matter which has nothing to do with Emjay or Guyana.

I was advised to use Keystone by a friend who has previous experience of their services. Throughout my engagement with them they were focused and engaged. Communication and attention to detail were excellent and they listened and advised as per the situation. I would reccommend Nigel Forsyth and his team for any of the services they provide.

Keystone Law represented my ex-wife in our divorce. All the details of our financial settlement had been agreed and signed off in mediation and I was simply expecting the solicitor at Keystone to draw up the Financial Consent Order, for which my ex and I jointly paid £1,258. However, without my initial knowledge this solicitor allowed my ex to engage in completely inconsequential back and forth contact between them which ultimate had zero effect on the financial settlement we'd previously agreed, but did however result in an additional bill of £8,700.

The whole point of mediation was the avoid the cost of lawyers fees, and despite my best efforts we ended up paying MORE to have our mediation agreement formally written up than I paid for ALL of our mediation.

I consider this lawyer's behaviour to have been an exercise in unnecessary charging and if not ethically, then certainly morally, questionable... Beware!!!

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Post Script following Keystone's reply:

Sorry, I should have made clear that yes, it was my wife who had instructed Keystone (although I did say that they represented her and not me), however despite all the "advice" that my wife received from the Keystone lawyer, it resulted in a zero financial improvement or indeed change to the settlement that we had BOTH agreed in mediation. So in fact, practically and financially speaking my ex and I were BOTH worse off (£4,350 each) as a result of your lawyer's additional intervention. There was no change to the FCO to what we had both signed off on with our mediator.

I believe your lawyer should have recognised that the job they were required to do at the outset, to simply legalise the financial consent order, should have been what they actually did or tried to do. In additiona, I believe as a co-payer that I should have been advised in advance that the lawyers was potentially undertaking work such that there would be additional charges. That is the part that wrinkles the most, that I had no knowledge of it.

In hindsight I should have said at the beginning, that my original payment was made under the expectation that the lawyer was simply being engaged to draft the FCO, and that I would not agree to any other actions that would result in any additional cost. Further, that should my then wife cause any action that would result in further charges, then they should be borne by her entirely.

As soon as I was aware that there were additional charges accruing as a result of my wife asking needless questions I expressed my shock and anger but was basically waved off.

Ultimately I had zero recourse, hence this review. I think what is both unquestionable and undeniable is that my ex wife (your client) did not materially benefit in any way from the exercise and in fact was almost £5,000 worse off for it.

Just as an aside, I have a family member who is both a retired solicitor AND a currently practising mediator, who felt the actions of this lawyer to be excessive at best, and whilst I know Keystone will characterise my review as sour grapes, I do firmly believe that no one's interests - other than Keystone's - were served here.

I think my advice to anyone reading this would be, if your partner is considering Keystone Law to represent them - against you - and you have any say in the matter, reconsider. Or at least make sure the parameters of engagement and payment are clearly defined before any work is undertaken.

"After struggling for a long time to handle my divorce on my own, I finally found the support I needed here at Keystone Law. Olive was understanding, supportive and effective in moving a difficult and stalled process forward. I'm very grateful for her help and support and I'd definitely recommend her to anyone who needs this kind of service. Visit Keystone Law and ask for Olive Gathoni.

Keystone law was recommended to me by family friends and I am very glad that they did.

I could not be more satisfied with Katie’s work; she was clear with her explanations of what was required, clearly more than knowledgable about the process and always quick to respond.

I would absolutely recommend Katie’s services to anyone looking to extend their lease, I could not be more pleased with her work.

I was referred to Corrine via a third party organisation and I couldn’t fault my experience. Corrine was professional and responsive and clearly knowledgeable in the area. She gave me sound advice and dealt with my case quickly.

I was extremely satisfied with Charlotte Pollards support and legal advice from Keystone. She is able to explain complex legal concepts in a clear way and provide the necessary guidance. She is also extremely flexible in terms of meetings and makes the extra effort to accommodate personal circumstances. I recommend Charlotte highly!

The best around, Sarah was patient, understanding and very informative, I couldn’t ask for a better service, without a doubt I will be using keystone law again. Definitely recommend!

Oh my goodness! Katie Cohen was beyond amazing when we used Keystone Law to obtain a lease extension. She truly went above and beyond in order to get it through as soon as possible. Katie took all the stress off us and we had total faith in her. She involved us at every stage which obviously removed the anxiety as we were not left wondering what point we were at. Katie works so promptly and her communication skills are superb. She is both professional and clearly extremely knowledgeable in her field. I would and have absolutely recommended both Katie and Keystone Law to anyone that needs professional assistance in this area. Thank you Katie and we will be back for the next instruction. I honestly cannot thank you enough.

I was recommended the services of Charlotte Pollard at Keystone Law, London, to write up our Wills. From our first meeting, Charlotte made the process of creating our Wills simple and stress-free. She explained every detail in plain language, answered all our questions with exceptional patience promptly and ensured our wishes were documented exactly as we needed. I left feeling confident and at peace knowing my affairs are in order thanks to Charlotte.
Charlotte was very thorough in preparing our Wills and anticipated issues I hadn’t even considered and offered solutions that protected my family’s future. The entire process was handled efficiently, and I truly felt my best interests were their top priority. I found her to be very approachable and accessible at all times.

I would definitely recommend her professional services in writing Wills at Keystone Law.
Sevda Onen

Highly recommend when buying a property. Kate Hathaway provided a great personal service. She was thorough and diligent, and explained everything very clearly. This meant I was able to have a full understanding of the process and make informed decisions. Couldn’t have been better. Many thanks.

Katie Cohen super delivered. She was perceptive, sensitive, discerning, made you feel safe and could anticipate what you needed before you asked. If she said that she was ‘on it’, you could trust that she was ‘in your corner’. She knew her job and she did if excellently which makes this experience so much sweeter as nearly 5yrs ago, she and her team could not take on our case because they were at capacity.

We selected Keystone from a list recommended by our surveyor. The selection was based on how quickly they responded to our inquiry and this quick response was a feature of all our dealings with them. Katie has been very easy to deal with and moved the process along very quickly. Great work.

Extremely pleased by the support given by Hannah Cornish @ Keystone with regards to a legal child arrangement.

Professional, empathetic and highly proficient, I can not recommend Hannah and Keystone Law enough. Needless to say, we got the result we were hoping for - thanks so much.

Jason was outstanding throughout the sale of our flat and the purchase of our new home. Clear communication, quick responses, and calm guidance at every stage. He explained each step in plain English, spotted issues early, and moved things forward even when others slowed the process down. Couldn’t recommend him more.

I had the good luck to have been given a recommendation for Laura Brown to assist me with some post-divorce financial proceedings. I was almost certain the matter could not be resolved without further litigation, but Laura's calm, considered and patient approach, together with some excellent quick thinking proved me wrong. I cannot recommend her highly enough. After over a decade of litigation, Laura has enabled me to put this matter behind me now. I am deeply grateful to her.

Corinne was a pleasure to deal with from start to finish. Always gave fair advice, was professional throughout and very easy to communicate with. Would highly recommend!

Emma Wayland assisted me on a contractual matter, and she was fantastic. Prompt, professional, quickly grasped the matter and what needed to be done - and acted swiftly and successfully.

Excellent service from Keystone partner Olive Gathoni. She drafted an agreement and was able to accommodate both parties’ interests while foreseeing future scenarios. She had the emotional awareness that the agreement requires and turned the agreement around in quick time. The cost was reasonable too. Highly recommend her service for family matters.

Joke of a law firm. Had the misfortune of dealing with them as they were chosen by my landlord when I was assigning a shop lease. £2,700 plus VAT for a very straightforward task. Slow, supercilious and unprofessional. Also refused to issue a VAT invoice after repeatedly requesting one. To the administrator of your reviews; please don’t post a reply feigning sympathy. If you cared about the way you treated paying clients in the first instance, you would conduct yourself differently and I wouldn’t need to write such a negative review.