The Guideline Hourly Rates changed on 1st January 2026. These are set out below. The 2025 and 2024 rates can be found underneath. Guideline hourly rates 2026 (with previous year’s rates in brackets) Grade Fee Earner London 1 London 2…
This section looks at decisions in relation to relief from sanctions and the general principles of CPR 3.9. Often there are links to the decisions themselves, together with links to posts on this blog. CASES IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER 2026 February…
The webinar on Mastering PD57AC – Getting Witness Statements Right in the Commercial Courts is now available “on demand”. You can watch it at your leisure. Booking details are available here. The webinar includes a series of checklists and a…
The guidance given in this case is obviously of interest to those who practice in the Court of Protection (as practitioner or expert). However some of the points made here are of general interest. In particular in relation to the…
We are going back to 2016 to look at a post about a case where the judge had noted that “both sides engaged in an aggressive and uncooperative correspondence that served only to heighten their mutual suspicion to newly raised…
We have another case where the judge considers the use of Artificial Intelligence in the preparation of witness statements. It was held that there was no good reason for this. He was concerned that ChatGPT had contributed to the witness…
In this case the judge granted permission to appeal when the appeal notice was lodged 25 days out of time. Not only is this an example of the court using its discretion under Denton and taking into accounts issues with…
Here we have a rare case where the Court of Appeal overturns a decision of the first instance judge to allow a party to amend their pleadings. There is a detailed analysis of why the proposed amendments were deficient. “I…
This case is interesting for several reasons. Firstly the judge considers whether the court has power to order security for costs in a detailed assessment. Secondly there are some interesting observations about the costs incurred in the assessment process (and…
This is a case where lessons can be learnt by both claimants and defendants. The claimant served at the wrong address, however the defendant did not respond promptly or timeously. KEY PRACTICE POINT There are lessons here for both parties….
We looked earlier this month at a case where the judge preferred the evidence of an expert who had “real world” experience of the matters in issue. There are similar themes in the judgment here. (We have looked at the…
For the past week we have looked at cases where judges have been critical of the failure to comply with the provisions of PD57AC. These issues are being addressed in the webinar tomorrow. In addition to looking at the guidance…
This case considers the costs liability of a person appointed under CPR 19.12 to represent a deceased person. The court made it clear that such an appointment is not directly analogous to that of an administrator or executor. Different costs…
The Solicitors Regulation Authority have sent out a short Note on selecting professional help to assess legal costs. It is worth reading. Indeed it may be regarded as essential reading. “Using an unregulated costs adviser can expose you and your…
PD57AC is very prescriptive in the guidance it gives in relation to the way in which documents are referred to in witness statements. This is another example of a rule that is often breached, with statements often referring to, and…
This judgment provides a short reminder that if a party wants to seek permission to appeal from the court that made the decision then that application must be made at the hearing being appealed itself, or any adjournment of that…
Here we have a reminder that failure to comply with rules and orders have consequences. In this case the consequences were that the Part 20 claimants’ action for damages was struck out. There had been a series of failures…
We have had a flurry of cases recently about the consequences of failing to pay the correct fee when issuing proceedings. Here we have a case where the court considers the implications of a failure to pay the correct fee…
Is service on a P.O. Box address good service? That was the issue being considered in this appeal. However the claimant was in for a bit of a shock. Enquiries by the judge revealed that the claim form had never…
The Court of Appeal’s recent decision in Attersley v UK Insurance Ltd [2026] EWCA Civ 217 has sharpened the costs risks faced by claimants who accept a Part 36 offer outside the relevant period. While a claimant who accepts late…
There has a been a regular flow of cases where the courts have commented that PD57AC has not been complied with, it is “more honoured in the breach than the observance”, was noted in one judgment. Given that these are…
This decision is important for two reasons. Firstly it upholds the original judgment that the interim bills in this case were statute bills and that there were no special circumstances to allow assessment out of time. Secondly it highlights the…
We usually review the opening lines of judgments at the end of the year. However I thought this would be a good way to start the week, ranging as it does from ancient Greece to Rome and then to important…
Here we are looking at a basic requirement that is often overlooked. When a party is applying for permission to rely on expert evidence there is a mandatory obligation to provide the court with an estimate of costs. THE…
It is useful to remember why the strictures in PSD57AC were introduced. It followed the report of the Witness Evidence Working Group which was produced at the end of 2019. That report highlighted some major issues in relation to the…
No sooner was the (metaphorical) ink dry on the previous post about loss of earnings when I received a useful case from David Platt KC. It is a judgment that contains much of interest to litigators (that we will return…
It is surprising how many allegations of negligence are made against lawyers because of a failure to consider and obtain damages for loss of earnings. In addition there are a growing number of cases where claimants have come to grief…
There are some interesting, and important, observations in this judgment about the use (or misuse) of applications to commit in civil proceedings. The judge felt that this case was part of a larger trend to “weaponise” contempt proceedings as part…
There is no shortage of posts about solicitor-client costs on this site (see the links section below). The Civil Justice Council have issued a Consultation Paper on reform of Part III of the Solicitors Act. “Whilst it might be expected…
THROWBACK FRIDAY: SCHEDULES AND COUNTER-SCHEDULES ARE NOT A “NUMBER CRUNCHING EXERCISE” (APRIL 2018)
If there is a judgment that still resonates in practical terms today it is the one we are considering here. It asks the answer how should schedules be drafted? It then gives the answers. This was in a case where…
Here we have a case where both parties failed to comply with a direction to file witness statements by a certain date. The court granted relief from sanctions, and it is easy to see why. However it is case that…
There are many who have doubts, often profound doubts, about the utility of class actions where each of the recipients will recover minute sums. Those doubters will have their views compounded by the judgment in this case. The likely damages…
Over the next week there will be a short series dealing with errors and omissions relating to witness statements and PD57AC. What is surprising is how much material there is. These rules are five years old this month, yet we…
Regular readers of this site will not need reminding of the strictness of the rules relating to service of the claim form. Here we have another example. The claimant failed to serve the sealed claim form within the period allowed…
Here we have an unusual issue, caused by the defendant agreeing to an unusual order (more accurately the removal of a proposed term of an order). The defendant was liable to pay the claimant’s costs of a hearing which were…
This case considers the issues that arise when a defendant has failed to comply with its statutory obligation to notify the Compensation Recovery Unit of a claim. What duties does the claimant have in these circumstances. The blunt answer is…
Here we have (yet another) case about a failure to comply with PD57AC. The response of the defendants here was simply to state that they would not cross-examine the claimants’ witnesses on material that was irrelevant or inadmissible. “I was…
The cases on service of the claim form continue to flow. Here the defendant appealed a decision that it was not necessary for a claimant to serve a sealed copy of an amended claim form. As we shall see the…
EXPERT WATCH 44: THE JUDGE PREFERS THE EVIDENCE OF ONE EXPERT OVER ANOTHER: IT IS AS SIMPLE AS THAT…
Here we have a case where success for the claimant rested almost wholly on their expert evidence being accepted. This is not altogether unusual for a clinical negligence case. What is notable about this case is that the treating doctor…
There is an ongoing consultation process about the use of email in civil procedure. It is now commonplace, almost universal. However what is the situation where the email, carrying important notification, lands inside the recipient’s spam box? That is the…
Here we have a classic case about witness recollection and accuracy. The result has already been widely reported given that it concerns the singer Amy Winehouse. The case rested, ultimately, on witness evidence “The factual findings in relation to this…
I was distressed to read the news that the extraordinary talented Giles Peaker passed away last weekend. The news can be found on his blog “Nearly Legal” which includes tribute from his firm Anthony Gold. NEARLY LEGAL Giles started his…
The previous post mentioned a webinar this Friday on deducting costs from the client’s damages. Right on cue this judgment occurred on that very topic. It makes some very important observations. It has created more work in preparing the webinar,…
Recent cases have shown that the issues relating to to deducting costs from the client’s damages remain controversial and highly contested. This webinar examines the regulatory framework and case law governing the deduction of legal costs from a client’s damages…
The previous post on costs and mediation led to me to look at the initial judgment on liability. This is because the court considered an argument that the situation with the claimant’s expert was so poor as to warrant indemnity…
Here we have a case where a claimant who lost a case at trial (and turned down an offer of £200,000) argued that there should be no order for costs. That argument did not take it very far… “The Defendant’s…
Here we have an unusual argument from the claimants. The judge, whilst issuing a warning that the claimants had to refer back to their pleaded case, allowed the claimants some latitude in cross-examination. This led the claimants to argue that…
In civil proceedings witnesses are commonly present throughout an entire action. On occasions a request is made that witnesses be excluded. There is little authority for the proposition that a court can exclude witnesses or guidance as to how the…
It is not that common for a judge to comment that a claim has been brought in an “unfocused manner”. It is even less common in a case where the case is heavily “lawyered”. We have an example here. The…
A post yesterday highlighted both the significance of a claim for loss of earnings for a child claimant, but also the difficulty. In that case the award for disability in the labour market of £50,000 was higher than the award…
Here we have a case where an important time limit was, on the face of it missed, because the court itself “thwarted” genuine attempts to lodge an appeal in time. It is an object lesson the care that needs to…
Here we look at at post from twelve years ago concerning judicial protestations about opinion evidence in witness statements. Despite all the warnings have occurred since, and the advent of PD57AC, this remains a regular (and improper) occurrence. We looked…
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