Legal Bills of Costs- How Can we Assist?

A legal bill of costs is required for a detailed assessment. It is a statement showing, in detail, all costs incurred on a case. Using a costs draftsman service to draft your bill of costs can be extremely beneficial. Many Solicitors are often so busy they forget to record their full time in the WIP records, and detailed consideration of both the file notes and time records will often yield further time recordings.

At LPS, we promise to carefully assess and quantify your file and ensure the full timings of your recoverable work are included. Further, we will advise you on anything that shouldn’t be claimed in the Bill to avoid unnecessary reductions on assessment.

What’s more, we can negotiate your Bills of Costs and conduct detailed assessment proceeding on your behalf.

Our charges are on a % profit recovered basis plus any detailed assessment costs recovered. This means our charges are always proportionate, and fully recovered from the paying party.

Electronic Bill of Costs

From 6th April 2018, use of the new electronic bill of costs was made compulsory in the County Courts and the Senior Courts Costs Office.

The new e-bill of costs was introduced to streamline costs procedures, and make billing easier and less expensive to prepare. Using the new electronic bill of costs provides more transparency on the level of costs being claimed, figures are easier to amend on assessment by any assessing officer, the Excel document is self-calculating, and it is simpler to understand in what phases costs have been incurred. It also makes it easier for paying parties to question the amounts being claimed by the paying parties.

An electronic bill of costs must be used in all multitrack cases except:

• Claims where proceedings are subject to fixed or scale costs
• Cases where the receiving party is a Litigant in Person
• When the Court has ordered otherwise (parties can agree by consent to not apply electronic billing)
• Where the Multi-Track costs claimed are before 6th April 2018

As the new rules came into force on 6th April 2018, an old-style bill of costs, or an electronic bill of costs can be used on cases which commenced before this date.

If you would like to find out more about the new electronic bills of costs, have a look at our article on the issue.

How Can LPS Assist?

The Legal Practice Support team are always happy to help with any budgeting issues and you can contact our Legal Costs Director at Robert.Collington@legalpracticesupport.co.uk for further information or contact us here. Our blog is updated regularly if you are interested in being kept up to date on all costs matters.