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IT Service Disputes

When IT services fail, the impact can be immediate and costly. We help organisations resolve IT service disputes, restore stability and exit underperforming arrangements with confidence.

Expert legal advice for your IT service disputes

When infrastructure, support or managed service arrangements start to break down, you may be left dealing with business disruption, spiralling costs and strained relationships with customers and suppliers.

IT service disputes often turn on operational discipline — availability, incident response, infrastructure resilience and the quality of day to day service management. We help organisations regain control by establishing where performance has fallen short and developing commercially practical strategies to restore stability, resolve long running issues or manage an orderly exit or transition to a more reliable service.

James Hartley's Profile

James Hartley

Partner & Divisional Head of Dispute Resolution

Common IT services disputes we can help with 

Common IT services disputes we can help with 

System implementation, migration & project failures

  • CRM migration disputes
  • Failed ERP, CRM and DMS implementations
  • Disputes over the procurement of IT systems

Operational performance & service delivery issues

  • Chronic underperformance in managed IT services
  • Failed or ineffective payroll and reporting systems
  • Pre action renegotiation of IT delivery contracts where deadlines, scope or service performance have broken down

Cybersecurity, data integrity & confidentiality disputes

  • Data breaches
  • Misuse of confidential information
  • Malfunctioning or ineffective AI driven cybersecurity services

Transition, exit & knowledge transfer failures

  • Defective onboarding, delayed transition or inadequate knowledge transfer
  • Disentanglement of data, tooling and access rights when exiting IT service arrangements
How we resolve IT service disputes

How we resolve IT service disputes

  • Early review of contractual obligations alongside service data, incident logs and SLA reports – to establish where the service has broken down and evaluate the dispute
  • Targeted technical analysis – with the right ITSM, cloud, network or cybersecurity or other specialists, we come up with an action plan to manage the practical and commercial fallout
  • Leverage technology – our expertise is supplemented by a technology-forward approach to litigation, unlocking costs savings through enterprise-secure generative AI, legal tech automation and advanced document management platforms
  • Focused escalation to ADR or litigation – when disputes must escalate, our industry expertise ensures that the real issues remain in focus

Recent IT service disputes experience

  • Acted for a global manufacturer in a dispute with an IT provider over systemic incident mismanagement, failed transition and breach of availability SLAs.

  • Advised on multiple claims involving failed implementations of ERP, CRM, and DMS products for both public and private sector clients.

  • Supported clients across various sectors on termination strategies, step in, and recovery of losses following breach of contracts for IT services.

  • Advised a leading property services group in a dispute with an international IT supplier over the migration to a new CRM system, including project scoping, change orders, and termination.

Testimonials

  • PGK

    "This was David v Goliath litigation, on a large scale; from the outside, the difficulties which the claimants faced now seem masked by the scale o...

    Patrick Green KC

    Henderson Chambers

  • "James Hartley and Freeths deserve huge credit for taking on this case. What is now recognised as the biggest miscarriage of justice in British his...

    Client testimonial

  • "Their dedication and expertise was extraordinary and they deserve due recognition for the vital and central role they played in unmasking the inju...

    Client testimonial

  • KD

    "Imogen Randall was exceptional throughout: she was indefatigable in her efforts to find justice for the subpostmasters and expose the truth behind...

    Kathleen Donnelly, Barrister

    Henderson Chambers

  • KF

    "In the face of ferocious denial of the claim by Post Office and its lawyers, and even when it looked like it could go either way on technical lega...

    Karl Flinders, Chief reporter

    Computer Weekly

  • "The team is excellent and can handle large and complex IT disputes. They give solid and realistic advice and are great at including counsel into t...

    The Legal 500, 2026

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