Quality is not yet a given, warn corporate counsel, who report that advisers are still not living up to their own sales pitch for commercial know-how. Michelle Madsen examines the findings of the latest Verdict survey.

Law firm claims of commercial savvy are failing to convince their audience, say clients, who argue that even basic quality of work from major City firms cannot yet be taken for granted.

This ongoing gripe was highlighted by the findings of this month's The Verdict poll of senior in-house lawyers, which focuses on the problems that cause general counsel to reject pitching firms and ditch existing advisers.

The Legal Week survey, conducted in association with Davies Arnold Cooper, found by far the most common mistake made by law firms pitching for new business was a failure to show commercial understanding, cited by 75% of respondents.

Other common gripes at pitches include a failure to listen to prospective clients' needs, cited by 39% of respondents, and the more prosaic 'sloppy presentation', which was highlighted by one in three corporate counsel.

The survey, which was carried out as a group of major European banks, including Barclays and Deutsche Bank, are gearing up for panel reviews, suggests City firms have a way to go yet before delivering on their own hype.

Sony Ericsson general counsel Jonathan Pearl said: "Poor outside counsel are the sort that do not understand the commercial realities of business. They have great theoretical ideas but cannot always find practical applications. Tempers do fray."

One corporate counsel said his team had been billed by a law firm for correcting errors that the firm itself had made and which had already been pointed out to the firm by the client.

And despite repeated claims from large City firms that 'quality is a given', a large proportion of respondents cited poor standards as a common problem.

Nearly two-thirds (64%) of respondents cited lack of quality as major reasons for ending an adviser relationship, the joint most common reason alongside 'over-charging/lack of value'. Other reasons cited for ending an existing relationship were 'lack of responsiveness' (28%) and 'lack of senior lawyer involvement/changes of personnel' (19%).

Nearly half of all respondents (47%) said they had ended a relationship with an adviser acrimoniously.

"Most firms concentrate on getting new clients," said Catherine Regan, general counsel at reinsurance firm Riverstone Management. "They should concentrate on better maintaining their existing relationships and constantly strive to deliver. When outsourcing, you really should not have to check the work."

Mark Maurice-Jones, European head of legal at cleaning product manufacturer Kimberly-Clark, commented: "With bigger firms you usually get a very good service, so I will not terminate a relationship with an entire firm due to a bad relationship with one person or team."

However, he conceded that when things go wrong at smaller firms it can be harder to reopen lines of communication.

Surprisingly, given the debate that has been raging about fees and billing structures, the survey found that no general counsel would end a relationship with a firm over a lack of billing transparency or if a firm failed to offer discounts for volume work.

Pearl said that if top-end work is done well, costs become irrelevant. "If quality is very high, money is relatively unimportant – it is an elastic cost. You cannot put a price on brilliant flashes of inspiration."

Nonetheless, Pearl did argue that the market was becoming less competitive and that the danger was for firms to get complacent: "People get pissed off with humdrum legal services."

Suzanne Smith, general counsel at pharmaceuticals company Phoqus Group, suggested that the onus lies on firms to learn from their mistakes. She said: "When a firm loses a client it would be sensible for someone senior who has not been directly involved in the situation to ask why the firm has been dropped. The person or team who caused the break in relations puts it down to difficult clients and the real reason is never discovered."

Talkback: Are City firms complacent about the quality of their work – and its value? Click here to have your say.