“In general, there is an expectation that the first draft of a witness statement can be undertaken by lower grade fee earners including Grade C solicitors and legal executives (and those with similar experience). This is particularly so since witness statements should, in general, be drafted in the witness’ own words. Whether and the extent […]
Appropriate grade of fee earner to draft witness statement Read More »
“Joint Settlement Meetings (JSM) It is not generally an objection to an allowance being made for a JSM that one or other party thinks such a meeting is unlikely to be required (unless it is clear that one will not be required or appropriate). It can be budgeted for on the assumption that one will
Budgeting for costs of JSM Read More »
“Level of fee earner. Issues might arise as to the seniority of the fee earner attending trial if a solicitor’s attendance is reasonably required. But even in high value cases it may not be reasonable for a senior solicitor to attend throughout a trial.” – from Costs Judge Simon Brown’s Note on costs budgeting in
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“In general in the KB a PTR is not considered necessary and often costs of 2/3 hours are allowed to deal with issues relating to listing and associated matters together with a listing fee where appropriate.” – from Costs Judge Simon Brown’s Note on costs budgeting in the King’s Bench involving high value personal injury
Budgeting for PTR in King’s Bench Read More »
“Consultations/conference with experts In some, if not many, cases these can be conducted by videolink without the need for experts to incur travel expenses or to spend time travelling. Whether allowance should be made for attendance of an expert in person is however case sensitive. It is recognised that where, for instance, liability is in
Do experts need to attend conferences in person? Read More »
“The court, in general, assumes that in all cases where parties have instructed different experts there will be, and will remain up to an including trial, a dispute between the experts. If and to the extent that there is no substantial or material dispute between the experts following service of reports or joint statements this
Does costs budgeting assume dispute between experts at trial? Read More »
Is a receiving party required to provide a breakdown between the cost of an expert report and the costs of a medical reporting organisation (“MRO”) approached to provide the report, or is it permissible for the receiving party to submit a bill which simply includes the fee charged by the MRO to provide the medical
Duty to provide breakdown of medical agency fees Read More »
“The assembling and pagination of bundles are generally to be regarded as administrative or secretarial tasks the costs of which are taken into account within the hourly rate of the fee earners involved; it is not generally separately chargeable (cf work done on preparing an index and deciding what documents should be included in a
Is work preparing hearing and trial bundles chargeable? Read More »
“In most cases solicitors can be expected to keep a running electronic bundle of documents which can be bookmarked and added to as and when new documentation is made available. This is so even in document heavy cases (perhaps particularly so in such cases). This bundle can then be edited (and the index annotated) so
The cost of reviewing medical records and preparing trial bundles Read More »
“Typically, junior grade D fee earners are, for instance, involved in obtaining medical records from medical providers (and the substantial involvement of higher grade fee earners in this task may be unreasonable).” – from Costs Judge Simon Brown’s Note on costs budgeting in the King’s Bench involving high value personal injury claims
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