The High Court has ruled that national firm Irwin Mitchell cannot claim back any extra costs from its client’s damages after ripping apart several elements of the bill.

In a provisional decision in BCX v DTA, Costs Judge Brown said a ‘substantial amount of unreasonable time’ had been incurred on the personal injury claim and that the work could and should have been done at far less expense.

Irwin Mitchell had represented a man who suffered a head injury in 2017 and whose claim settled pre-trial for a lump sum payment of £1.3m last year.

The costs payable by the defendant were agreed at £330,000 and Irwin Mitchell had not waived its entitlement to claim further costs against the claimant, seeking a total sum of £160,000. This including a £95,000 so-called ‘shortfall’ in profit costs, a success fee of £63,000 and £1,900.

The court heard that the claimant’s litigant friend had agreed to the deductions sought but the costs judge refused to accept that this was an end of the matter.

‘Whilst I have every reason to be believe that the litigation friend in this case has acted conscientiously and assiduously in the interests of the protected party, I have not been given any sufficient basis for thinking that she is in a position to give informed consent to the deductions,’ he said. 

The judge highlighted concerns with the bill of costs presented by Irwin Mitchell that would form the basis for the ‘shortfall’ deductions. He objected to two fee earners attending an introductory meeting and said the travel time claimed appeared to be unreasonable.

The hourly rate of £365 for a Grade A fee earner based in Bristol was approved, but the judge said hourly rates for Grade B (£300-325), Grade C (£245-260) and Grade D (£145) fee earners were ‘unusual’ and appeared ‘unreasonably high’. The judge said he was struck by the amount of time claimed for routine correspondence without any real detail provided.

He also expressed ‘considerable concerns’ about the £86,000 claimed for 290 hours of work on what was in most respects a ‘relatively straightforward claim’. These costs were pared down to £55,000.

On disclosure, the judge added that the involvement of different fee earners at times duplicating the work down by others was likely to have ‘substantially contributed to the excessive nature of the costs’.

The total costs allowed were set at £275,000 – less than the figure the defendant already had to pay.

The success fee uplift was reduced from 20% to 15% and the ATE premium allowed in full.