Costs Lawyers
Historically, costs draftsmen or negotiators had no rights of audience of their own and were either seen by the courts as de facto short term employees of solicitors or fell foul of the law (as per “Ahmed V Powell”). In those circumstances many agreements between costs draftsmen and solicitors were potentially unlawful and champertous.
By virtue of the Association of Law Costs Draftsmen Order 2006, the Association of Law Costs Draftsmen became an authorised body pursuant to the Courts and Legal Services Act 1990 to grant its members rights to conduct litigation and provide advocacy services in respect of costs litigation. In late 2007 a limited number of Fellows of the Association undertook the necessary training and the first of a new breed of “Costs Lawyers” were created.
Civil and Commercial Costs Lawyers Ltd is one of only a handful of companies in which the Practising Director and a number of senior employees have undertaken this training and accordingly can call themselves costs lawyers and provide the additional service benefits and comforts that can only come with the knowledge that one is engaging an authorised individual with rights of audience and a right to conduct litigation.
Benefits
To use Costs Lawyers will streamline and reduce the cost of the process, Costs Lawyers will be able to provide a complete costing service without the duplication of then having to pass the matter to Solicitors or Counsel if settlement fails. Likewise, Costs Lawyers are qualified to deal with all procedural steps from the date of the costs order, removing the necessity for the solicitor to remain active in the costs process, thus freeing up their time and resources and extinguishing their additional fees.
Accordingly, as legitimate legal service providers, we are able to enter into funding arrangements including conditional fee agreements which will go further to minimize the cost of the cost recovery process for instructing Parties. Please see our funding arrangements page for further details.
The advantages are therefore clear, costs negotiation and litigation undertaken by the true experts in a streamlined, economic and specialist fashion.
This effectively means that, unlike most costs negotiators and many draftsmen, we have the ability in our own right to conduct litigation, we can enter into CFAs and, generally, our services are legitimately recognized. In respect of costs litigation, our standing is now little different from solicitors or barristers.