Bennelong Legal, Carlingford, NSW

"I do not recommend Bennelong Legal firm . The principal attorney caused uneccesary, added conflict within my family at an already difficult time. My father hired the principal attorney at Bennelong Legal to handle his estate and my father appointed one of my brothers as executor. At the time of my father's passing my brother and I were having difficulties. I live in another country, so I contacted the principal attorney explaining that due to these difficulties I would appreciate his clarification of the process and timeline of the estate settlement, as it had already been difficult communicating with my brother. He 'seemed' to empathise with my situation and then revealed problems that he had experienced within his own family estate settlement during our conversation. At the ened of our call he said, "feel free to get in touch if you have any more questions, you have my phone number and email address". Several months later my brother was not responding to my messages (about the releasing of my fathers ashes), hence I decided to contact the principal attorney to ask him a couple of questions about the timeline of my father's estate. I felt comfortable in contacting him given his suggesting that I do so, if I had any more questions. The questions that I asked (via email) were in no way a private matter, only about timelines- and after all, I was one of the four recipients of the estate. However, instead of 1) answering my question OR 2) saying, no, I have realised that I should only answer questions from your brother, the executor, the principal attorney replied to my email to him and copied in my brother. The principal attorney's tone had completely changed- and he acted as if he had never suggested that I contact him! He could have easily replied to my email and said, "I have decided that you can not ask me questions" and that could have been the end of it. But in his needlessly copying in my brother he created further problems in my family. My take away from this is that the principal attorney (and owner) of Bennelong legal is not trustworthy. Having said one thing to you directly, he will then do/say the complete opposite. But not only that, he knew that what he did would cause added conflict in my family and yet he still did it. And for this reason I would NOT recommend him if you are looking for a trustworthy attorney."