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A Report On The Bill Of Costs

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Good Morning John,

I note from your initial instructions for the above matter that there is a further sum of money that you wish for me to include in the Bill of Costs. At this stage I am unsure as to what these costs have resulted from but there are strict rules as to what and how we recover costs and I wanted to briefly explain the same. If the costs have not been incurred or cannot be claimed under your retainer then recovering them will not be possible without breaching statutory or regulatory obligations. It is essential that the retainer is valid for all of the costs you wish to recover as without this validity– you as the solicitor will not be able to recover costs (JH Milner &Son v Percy Bilton Ltd [1966] 1 WLR).

Your right to …show more content…

If you have not informed your client and if there is no contractual right to increase rates in the retainer then unfortunately we will be bound by what is contractually stated. The costs of the litigation have been incurred on behalf of the Claimant, the Bill must therefore represent what the Claimant has ‘agreed’ to pay to you for your services. We cannot recover any costs that the Claimant is not liable to pay.

Furthermore, as per the Law of Contract we cannot include costs until you have actually carried out the work so if the costs you mention are in relation to work you are going to do then unfortunately we cannot seek any remuneration as the matter has now settled.

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If your instructions refer to including costs relating to work that is not on file then we must ensure that compliance with the Codes is maintained. If you have done the work then we can include it as it should be able to be evidenced through the work done and we can justify this to the paying party; but without evidence the costs will be difficult to recover if they come into dispute. The Bill needs to be sufficiently particularised, otherwise costs could be void for inadequate information (Re Kingsley 1978).

If you are expecting me to include costs for work that has not

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