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England and Wales High Court (Senior Courts Costs Office) Decisions


You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> England and Wales High Court (Senior Courts Costs Office) Decisions >> The Imaging Centre Mobile Ltd v Morr & Co LLP [2025] EWHC 1039 (SCCO) (30 April 2025)
URL: http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Costs/2025/1039.html
Cite as: [2025] EWHC 1039 (SCCO)

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Neutral Citation Number: [2025] EWHC 1039 (SCCO)
Case No: SC-2022-APP-000230

IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
SENIOR COURTS COSTS OFFICE

Thomas More Building
Royal Courts of Justice
London, WC2A 2LL
30/04/2025

B e f o r e :

COSTS JUDGE ROWLEY
____________________

Between:
THE IMAGING CENTRE MOBILE LIMITED
Claimant
- and -

MORR & CO LLP
Defendant

____________________


____________________

HTML VERSION OF APPROVED JUDGMENT
____________________

Crown Copyright ©

    This judgment was handed down remotely at 10.30am on 30 April 2025 by circulation to the parties or their representatives by e-mail and by release to the National Archives.
    .............................

    Costs Judge Rowley:

    Introduction

  1. By a consent order dated 7 February 2025, the parties reached a compromise in respect of these detailed assessment proceedings brought in accordance with the Solicitors Act 1974.
  2. The only outstanding issues related to the costs of the proceedings. The defendant's costs generally were to be paid by the claimant. However, the costs in relation to an application concerning special circumstances were to be paid by the defendant to the claimant. Neither side's costs have proved capable of agreement and the order of 7 February 2025 provided for the court to deal with those costs on paper by way of summary assessment.
  3. The claimant's costs of the special circumstances application

  4. These costs are claimed in the sum of £6,657.50. I have very little to say about them and it seems to me that the defendant's criticisms were also relatively limited. I do not accept the argument that, in some way, the need for special circumstances at all was caused by a failure on the part of the claimant to act sufficiently quickly. The Solicitors Act 1974 sets out a timetable of the hoops through which the client has to jump when bringing proceedings depending on how quickly they do so. In the circumstances of this case, the claimant was entitled to bring proceedings provided it could show special circumstances existed. Those circumstances were originally opposed by the defendant and then conceded prior to the hearing and that is not a promising set of facts on which to argue that the claimant was somehow at fault.
  5. I was not particularly attracted either to the suggestion that the first draft of the witness statement of Mr Kleanthous, the guiding mind of the claimant, should be drafted by him rather than either Mr Goodwin or his daughter, who is a solicitor. Having reviewed Mr Kleanthous' witness statement for the purposes of this decision, it is a detailed document and I have little doubt that more time was in fact spent than the capped time actually claimed, by some margin.
  6. There is no challenge to the hourly rates claimed and, in my view, there is little to be challenged in respect of the time claimed either. I had concluded that a modest reduction to Mr Goodwin's time to 20 hours in respect of documents was appropriate - and that therefore roughly £6,000 ought to be allowed – when I noticed the claimant's counterproposal of that figure in any event. I therefore allow the claimant's costs of the special circumstances' application in this sum and, as agreed by the parties, it will be set off against the defendant's costs.
  7. The defendant's costs

  8. I remind myself that this is a summary assessment because the challenges by the claimant are lengthy and detailed and the written response by the defendant runs to more than nine pages. I do not propose to deal with the detail set out by the parties. If a detailed assessment was required, then the parties ought to have agreed that approach.
  9. The defendant's claim for costs amounts to £85,725.50. There is no claim for VAT as the defendant is providing its own services and the VAT of others, such as counsel, can be recovered as input tax. There is also no time claimed for attendances upon the defendant as an entity. Since Ms Fisher has been the lead fee earner in these proceedings and is also the Managing Partner, that is also perfectly understandable.
  10. These proceedings settled after the preliminary issues were dealt with and we did not reach the point of any decision regarding hourly rates. They are challenged as being far in excess of the guideline hourly rates for "London 3". That is undoubtedly the case in relation to the two Grade A fee earners who appear on the schedule and also the two Grade D fee earners. The Grade C work is claimed at rates which are closer to the guidelines.
  11. I do not, as a general rule, take the view that the hourly rates claimed in the detailed assessment proceedings ought to differ from the rates allowed in the substantive proceedings. In this case, those rates have been compromised and so there is more weight to be given to the Samsung guidelines of the Court of Appeal in respect of a summary assessment than may sometimes be the case. Whilst the underlying proceedings would, in my view, justify the sort of hourly rates claimed by the Grade A's, that is not the case for the hourly rates claimed for the lower grades, and in particular the Grade Ds, and I take that into account.
  12. I do not think there is anything remarkable in relation to the time claimed on opponents. The time claimed on others, which no doubt relates to counsel and in particular the costs lawyers, is substantial. Some of that time, no doubt, relates to the fact that supplemental replies were allowed in the directions and that there were directions hearings and without prejudice meetings that would involve counsel and the costs lawyers as well as the defendant's own fee earners.
  13. In relation to attendance at the hearing, the time claimed by Mr Cox is not really challenge, albeit there is some query over the travelling and waiting time. I do not understand why Ms Fisher has claimed her travelling and waiting but not her attendance. Either she was entitled to all of this or none at all, in my view. She attended to give evidence and, it seems to me, that the time claim should be seen in that light. As such I do not think the travelling time is recoverable.
  14. The solicitors' charges come to £44,177.50. Nearly £30,000 of that sum is contained in the documents schedule which, as is usually the case, is the largest item. The most striking aspects in my view are the amount of time claimed in respect of Ms Fisher's witness statement and the preparation of the N260. Ms Fisher has spent 29.6 hours on that statement herself and grade C fee earners have spent up to 19 hours (albeit that some of the 14 hours claimed initially appears to relate also to the costs draftsman and counsel.) Even if all that Grade C time did not relate to the witness statement, the time still seems to me to be rather longer than appropriate. In relation to the schedule of costs, 4.2 hours at any grade seems to me to be much too long.
  15. A great deal of the documents' item is challenged by the claimant. In addition to the elements I have mentioned above, almost all of it is challenged as being either excessive or unnecessary. Whilst I accept some of the challenges, it does not seem to me that items such as the provision of trial bundles can really be criticised. Where witnesses are giving evidence, it is not sufficient simply to provide electronic bundles and that is not what the practice direction regarding "electronic working" says in any event.
  16. In order to consider the documents item properly, a view also has to be taken of the work undertaken by counsel and the costs lawyers. In relation to Mr Cohen, it seems to me that an advice on the merits as well as the brief fee are reasonable to be claimed (the latter being agreed by the claimant) but the additional work seems to me to be irrecoverable between the parties.
  17. In relation to Kain Knight, the claimant offers 70 hours at £170 per hour without the benefit of a breakdown. The breakdown was subsequently provided in the claimant's written document and which confirms that the hourly rate actually claimed is £195. That rate seems to me to be sufficiently similar for there to be little argument about it. But taking that hourly rate and dividing it into the fees charged provides a time of approximately 134 hours and that, in my view, is much too high, particularly where there was little advocacy carried out by the costs lawyers in addition to producing the breakdown and replies and attending the WP meetings. I allow 100 hours at £195 per hour.
  18. Taking into account these reductions in respect of counsel and the costs lawyers, I take the view that £20,000 in respect of the documents item is reasonable. To that sum I add £4,000 in respect of attendance at the hearing and £7,500 regarding attendance on opponents and others. Consequently, I reach the following figures:
  19. Profit Costs - £31,500 (7,500 + 4,000 + 20,000)

    Counsel - £13,750

    Costs Lawyers - £19,500

    TOTAL - £64,750

  20. Whilst the defendant has encouraged me to consider the reasonableness and proportionality of the individual items as I have carried out the summary assessment, and appreciating that authorities such as West versus Stockport NHS Foundation Trust refer to this approach, I find it to be very difficult to consider proportionality on an individual item basis. Consequently, I have taken the approach of allowing what I consider to be the costs which are reasonable before stepping back and deciding whether the figure I have now reached of £64,750 bears a reasonable relationship to the factors set out in CPR 44.3(5).
  21. The six factors in CPR 44.3(5) are the sums in issue, any non-monetary relief, the complexity of the litigation, any additional work generated by the conduct of the paying party, any wider factors involved in the proceedings and any extra work caused by vulnerability of a party or any witness. The eight bills which formed the substance of these detailed assessment proceedings amounted to £316,464.42. There was no non-monetary relief sought by the claimant and I am not convinced that any of the other factors that I have identified weigh particularly heavily in the scales. The issue of estimates and retainers always contains a certain amount of complexity in unravelling the parties' histories of events and the effect they say those histories had upon them. Nevertheless, it seems to me that looking at the sum involved in this case, it is clear that the reasonable costs that I have allowed for proceedings which reached a two-day hearing requiring a written reserved judgement bears a reasonable relationship to the sums in issue as well as the other factors set out in CPR 44.3(5). Consequently, I conclude that the sum that I have allowed is both reasonable and proportionate.
  22. In accordance with the agreement of the parties the £6,000 owing to the claimant needs to be deducted from the £64,750 payable to the defendant leaving a balance of £58,750 to be paid.

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