Page 24 - PIC-Magazine-Issue-26

COP COP COP COP
Head of Court of Protection
Paul Cruickshanks COSTS ROUND UP
at A&M Bacon.
Hello and welcome back to my regular round up of all things COP Costs. I am delighted to have
been asked to contribute, once again, to this publication and I hope the information provided
below will be useful for deputies and practitioners within the Court of Protection alike.
hings have been a little quieter
of late, at least in the costs
world, if not the actual practice
area of the Court of Protection!
That said, I have identifi ed a
couple of issues that have arisen over
the past six months or so, which I felt
might be useful to share.
I’d thought I’d kick things off by taking
a look at, once again, fi les and how
these can be presented to the SCCO.
Not least, I felt it would be prudent
to consider the impact of one’s fi le
over the assessment and how your
result could potentially be impacted,
both in presenting a “perfect” fi le and
what might happen when your fi le is
incomplete.
I thought then I would touch upon the
ongoing increases to the Guideline
Hourly Rates and a few factors you
might want to consider to ensure
you can continue to recover the full
rates, as well as looking at options
for enhancements and further
consideration to be given in that
Presentation of fi les to the SCCO
regard, to ensure any enhancements
sought can be recovered.
I haven’t provided an update as to
the current SCCO turnaround times
recently, so I thought I would do that
also, just to bring you all up to date.
As ever, this article will be of interest
to professional deputies and/or those
assisting a professional deputy and to
practitioners working within the Court
of Protection.
Physical Or Hard Copy Files
Around 10% of our instructions into A & M come accompanied by a
good, old fashioned hard copy, paper fi le. The SCCO are still happy
to accept your fi les in this way. It is always worthwhile ensuring you
send your fi les (whether to your costs draftsman or the court) via
tracked means, such as a trusted courier. At A & M, we also ensure
that we make sure your fi les have been safely delivered to the SCCO,
so as to ensure nothing has gone missing in transit. Given the current
delays at the SCCO (see below for further information on this), we felt
it important to ensure safe delivery of your fi les, as any issues will not
come to light until over a year after they have been sent to the court.
Your fi le should contain the following (which should include time
taken, details of the fee earner completing the work and the date
the work was undertaken, as well as a detailed description of the
work undertaken:
Attendance notes to record any routine telephone calls
Attendance notes to record any longer telephone calls
Attendance notes to record any preparation work (e.g.
drafting documents, reviewing information etc)
Attendance notes to record any meetings and/or personal
attendances (along with details of any travel time and
expenses incurred)
Copies of all letters sent
Copies of all emails sent
Ideally, your fi le should be in chronological order. This will enable
the Costs Offi cer to easily and quickly locate any fi le notes they
might wish to inspect, when assessing your bill.
Electronic Files
Your fi le should be presented in exactly the
same way as described for physical fi les above.
Again, the Costs Offi cers prefer the documents
to be presented in chronological order. Further,
if you have the facility to hyper-link documents,
this serves to make the Costs Offi cer’s job that
much easier.
Your electronic fi le can be uploaded to the court’s
Document Upload Centre (DUC), in lieu of sending
them to the SCCO via courier.
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INDUSTRY EXPERTS
Impact On Assessment
A complete and well-presented fi le can really get
the costs offi cer on side. I doubt, for one minute,
the Costs Offi cers will have the time or inclination
to go through each and every attendance note or
document and reconcile these with each and every
item claimed within the bill of costs. However,
should the Costs Offi cers wish to inspect a specifi c
attendance note or document, if they can easily
locate the same, and then fi nd a well typed,
detailed attendance note, this will only serve to
ensure the chances of your recovering that item
are maximised. This will also assist your draftsman,
who will be able to include full details of the
work undertaken in the bill and, where relevant,
the narrative.
Partners In Costs