Consumer polling: Summary of consumer research conducted to inform the SRA's consumer protection review
14 November 2024
Published as part of our Consumer Protection Review Consultation
Overview
The SRA conducted online polling with 2,009 consumers using the online consumer panel, Prolific. The polling sought to determine some aspects of awareness of consumer protection and regulation of legal services, gauging how essential consumers feel a range of protections to be as well as capturing views on client accounts.
Fieldwork took place between 14 and 17 March 2024. The sample was representative of the population of the United Kingdom for age, sex, ethnicity and working status and reflects population proportions for England and Wales.
No quota was applied for respondents' use of legal services. Thirty percent of respondents had used a regulated legal services provider in the last two years. Of these, 90% had used a solicitor and 47% of them checked whether their provider was regulated before instruction.
Legal services providers were most used for residential conveyancing, Wills, trusts and tax planning and Probate and estate administration.
Data tables are presented in the Appendix. Significance testing has been conducted at the 95% confidence level. Where reported, this means we can be 95% confident that any differences are real.
For a sample of 2,000, where at least 70% of respondents agree, the confidence interval at the 95% confidence level is +/- 2%. Where 60% or 50% of respondents agree, the confidence interval is +/- 3%.
The confidence interval is the range of values the true response is likely to fall between. The confidence level is how sure we are. For example, if 90% of respondents agree, with a confidence interval of +/-2% and a confidence level of 95% we can be 95% confident that the real value lies between 88% and 92%.
This polling was designed to be the first step in our mixed method approach to consumer research. It helped us to understand consumer views, often unprompted or with little background knowledge.
The findings have been used to help shape the design of the subsequent in-depth deliberative research with consumers.