Recent Costs Cases

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There is some good news and some not so good news contained in four recently reported costs cases.

1. In Kurian v Falzon Master Leonard decided that the Incipitur Rule continues to apply and there was no good reason to depart from the normal starting point in relation to interest. Therefore interest on costs should run from the date of the Consent Order which settled quantum and provided for the Defendant to pay the Claimant's costs. The Judgment contains a full consideration of the authorities on interest on costs including the recent decisions of Gray v Toner, Bridle v Ikhlas and Motto v Trafigura. This case will reopen arguments on interest on costs at least until the Court of Appeal decision in Motto which is expected in the New Year.
2. In Javed v BT Plc the Court concluded that proceedings had been issued prematurely and that accordingly the Claimant's costs should be assessed in line with the fixed recoverable costs under CPR Part 45.
3. In J N Dairies Ltd v Johal Dairies Ltd and Gurbir Singh there was a consideration of whether success fees should be awarded on work done before the Conditional Fee Agreements were entered into (the CFA was retrospective). It was decided that the retrospective success fees were not reasonably incurred and should therefore be disallowed.
4. The Court considered whether the Claimant had suffered an injury in a road traffic accident as described in Part 45.7 in the case of Schneider v Door2door PTS Ltd. The Claimant had been injured whilst walking up a ramp to enter a stationary vehicle which had been provided to transport her home from hospital. After a consideration of the authorities and the wording of Part 45.7 the Court concluded that the Claimant had indeed been injured as a result of a road traffic accident and that accordingly fixed recoverable costs applied.

If you have any queries regarding these cases, or indeed about any other costs issues, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Andrew Neat

A Neat Legal Services - Law Costs Draftsmen and Legal Costs Consultants