Costs & Funding

There is no point doing a piece of work if you are not entitled to be paid.

If you fail to comply with various legal and regulatory requirements, you may not be entitled to payment.  We advise on how to ensure that you do get paid.  We have advised on:

• How to draft enforceable Conditional Fee Agreements under the Courts and Legal Services Act 1990 as amended by LASPO;
• How to transfer CFAs validly by assignment or novation, if a retainer is transferred on a change of firm;
• Legality of different funding agreements, such as Damages Based Agreements;
• What costs information you must give clients, in order to be able to recover your costs;
• Defining costs and disbursements in your terms of business, and in your bills;
• Meeting the requirements of the SRA Accounts Rules 2019;
• How to ensure that you can sue on an interim bill;
• Responding to clients’ complaints over costs, and handling complaints to the Legal Ombudsman;
• The client’s entitlement to their file if there is a dispute over costs, and when you are entitled to exercise a lien;
• Challenging a client’s entitlement to an indemnity under After the Event Insurance.