Contentious work
Contentious work is work that relates to litigation i.e. if your matter has been issued at court then it is regarded as contentious. Arbitration is also contentious work but matters that are brought before a tribunal e.g. employment tribunal claims, are not regarded as contentious work.
You are not entitled to request a Remuneration Certificate if your matter is contentious, you can only challenge your solicitors costs by having the bill assessed by the court under the Solicitors Act 1974.
If you have paid your bill over one year ago then you will have lost the right to challenge the bill. It is therefore important that you do not delay.
However, there are a number of technical requirements relating to solicitors' bills. If the "bill" you receive does not comply with those requirements (which are set out in section 69 of the Solicitors Act), your time for challenging it will not have started to run. Consequently, even if you have paid your solicitor's costs more than one year ago it may still be possible to mount a challenge. Again, we will be pleased to advise you further on this point.
You are automatically entitled to have your bill assessed if you issue assessment proceedings within one month of receipt of the bill. If more than one month has passed, you may still be entitled to have the bill assessed but the Court may impose conditions for example, you may be ordered to pay part or even the full amount of the bill.
If the bill is over one year old but you have not paid it, you may still be entitled to have the bill assessed but only if you are able to demonstrate "special circumstances" to the Court. "Special circumstances" are not defined but may included cases where there is an obvious error in the bill or the costs are substantially in excess of the estimate of costs given to you at the outset of the case.
In contrast to the Remuneration Certificate procedure this procedure is not free and as a general rule you will only be awarded your costs of bringing the assessment proceedings if you are successful in having the bill reduced by at least 20% at assessment.
If the bill is reduced by less than 20% you will almost certainly be ordered to pay the solicitors' costs as well as your own. This is an important consideration when deciding whether or not you should proceed with the assessment procedure and we are more than happy to advise you as to whether you are likely to be successful in challenging your solicitors' costs through this procedure.