Website Review: Law Offices of Ret & Raad, Copenhagen

Law firm reviewed: Ret & Raad Copenhagen
URL 1: http://www.rrkobenhavn.dk (“the Copenhagen site”)
URL 2: http://www.ret-raad.dk/Offices/Kobenhavn.aspx (“the portal site”)
Date 1st review: April, 2009
Date 2nd review: October 2, 2009

Published by Legal Examiner, www.advocate-general.com

A free copy of this review with documentation was submitted to the law firm, which has indicated that the material is of no value to them. Hoping to achieve progress based upon confidentiality, the publisher has offered the law firm an exclusive license free of charge and with no other obligation than to report back within three months what, if any, elements they found helpful. The law firm never responded to this offer.

Introduction

Ret & Raad Copenhagen essentially has two websites: The Copenhagen site, which it independently owns and operates; the portal site, which is owned and operated by Ret&Raad A/S, a leading Danish chain of independent law firms.
The current review focuses narrowly upon the pages of the portal site that are directly devoted to Ret & Raad Copenhagen. The portal, an extensive website covering approximately fifty law firms, has been reviewed as a whole in a parallel report.

Findings and recommendations

Links

By using an automated system that tested all links, we found 8 broken hyperlinks on a single page within the Copenhagen site. We consider this a serious error.

RECOMMENDATION 1: The page in question is apparently redundant and can be removed.

Errors in descriptive content

Having carefully read all descriptive content and several legal articles on the Copenhagen site, we have found a rather large amount of errors that can and should be easily detected. What we found were grammatical errors, spelling errors, formatting errors, and various other writing errors.

For example, we detected a minor error in descriptive content on one of the lawyers’ profile page, which seems rather sloppy given the very limited amount of text that is provided.

On another page alone, we found no less than five minor errors, including obvious formatting errors, one typing error, and one grammatical error. This is a further indication of lack of basic proofreading.

RECOMMENDATION 2: Please have someone professionally proofread the entire Copenhagen site thoroughly as soon as possible. In the future, have all new materials professionally proofread prior to publication.

Privacy policy

The Copenhagen law firm collects personal data via its feedback form, yet it has no stated privacy policy. We consider this a minor error.

RECOMMENDATION 3: Please consider adopting a privacy policy. At a minimum, a simple notice should be provided to advise visitors about whether their data will be shared and for what purposes it may be used.

False information about article dates

We observed that all of Ms. M's 7 articles on Ret & Raad's portal were dated October 2, 2009, which is the date of this review. Similar patterns apply to all articles throughout the portal site due to an automated system.

The practice of conveying dates that are untrue falsely conveys the impression that content is up-to-date, thus misleading the reader. We have rated this a serious error in several sections, as was found appropriate.

RECOMMENDATION 4: Ret & Raad Copenhagen should use its influence to get the nationwide chain, in which it is a shareholder, to abandon automatic updating of article dates throughout the portal in favor of a system that provides readers with the current and accurate publication dates that they both expect and so richly deserve.

(EDITOR'S NOTE: Upon revisiting the website on December 29, 2009, we have observed that the publication dates for Ms. M's articles have been updated. The revised publication dates are December 5-15, 2008, almost one year prior to the artificial dates critiqued above. The revised dates probably do not show us when the articles were first published, but rather when they were added to the portal's repository. While not perfect, this is a significant improvement, which we believe is a direct result of our sustained critique.) 

Missing information about article dates

The legal articles on www.rrkobenhavn.dk are not dated, making it impossible for the reader to know when they were first published and when they were last updated, if applicable. This is unfortunate, especially since many of the articles purport to be describing the current legal situation and/or current market conditions.

The absence of dates for articles of legal content also means that the website does not adhere to common professional standards.

We have rated this issue as a serious error as far as the quality of legal content is concerned. While we have not yet made further deductions in the legal and regulatory compliance section, we may do so in the future unless the issue is resolved.

RECOMMENDATION 5: All articles on the Copenhagen site should be equipped with current and accurate publication dates.

Overstatement of important facts

It is inaccurate when the portal, www.ret-raad.dk, states that the Copenhagen firm has 6 experienced attorneys. In fact, it has 5 experienced attorneys plus one legal associate who apparently graduated from law school in 2008. We consider this a minor error.

Please note that the information about the number of lawyers is provided within the context of the firm claiming to be one of the chain's largest. Presumably, any factual inaccuracies are quite deliberate.

RECOMMENDATION 6: Please change the wording to indicate that the firm has 5 experienced attorneys and one legal associate.

Confusing terminology about important facts

It is observed that Mr. N is referred to as a legal associate, not a partner on the portal site. By this count, the firm has five partners including Mr. H, whom the portal refers to as a proprietor.

In our opinion, the distinction between partners and proprietor is not clear, which means that using these terms in combination without sufficient explanation may cause confusion and make it harder for visitors to ascertain who is legally responsible at the firm. We consider this to be a minor error.

RECOMMENDATION 7: Either abandon the confusing mix of titles (proprietor, partner) or explain what these titles mean as far as ownership and liability towards clients.

Inconsistent information about important facts

By contrast, the Copenhagen site lists Mr. N as one among six partners. From our perspective, doing so is unfortunate from several points of view:

1. Calling a legal associate a partner in a law firm is misleading, insofar as only licensed attorneys can practice law alone or in collaboration with others, c.f. our analysis of the Danish Administration of Justice Act.

2. Counting the legal associate among the partners creates inconsistency between important descriptive information on the portal and on the firm´s private website, respectively. Such a discrepancy reduces the trustworthiness of both websites.

3. Referring to a legal associate as a partner constitutes unfair marketing, and prospective clients may easily be mislead into believing that Mr. N is legally responsible when in fact he is not.

RECOMMENDATION 8: If the legal associate is not a partner in the law firm in a conventional sense, the headline should be modified somehow to reflect that he is not. In the highly unlikely event that the associate is actually a partner in the law firm in a conventional sense, the portal site should be updated to reflect this so as to ensure consistency between the two websites.

Design imperfections

It is observed that the hyperlinks on at least one page are close together. This would be workable if all of the headlines were just one line long, but some of them take up two lines, making it harder to distinguish between each headline. We consider this an imperfection.

RECOMMENDATION 9: Creating a bit of space between the headings structured as a list will make the site easier to navigate.