As of 1 January 2022, the SCCO will continue to require all provisionally assessed bills to be submitted alongside a completed bill summary, and for this to be e-filed to request the issuing of the Final Costs Certificate.
However, the bill will also need to be recalculated in accordance with Practice Direction 47 of the Civil Procedure Rules. As such, this will necessitate the recalculation of the bill of costs on a line-by-line basis, with the new amounts for each item of work annotated onto the bill.
Previously, only annotating the totals allowed across the bill on assessment in respect of VAT, profit costs and disbursements has been accepted. This will not be the case as of the New Year. This is an onerous task and time spent preparing these line-by-line recalculations will not be recoverable.
Clarion are currently working with the SCCO and Professional Deputies Forum to identify a suitable interim solution before the New Year for the firms that we work with. Further updates will be circulated in due course.
The E-bill continues to be developed for use and the eventual introduction of this will remove the need for archaic recalculations. We hope to find a solution in the meantime, which results in no additional cost to the Deputy or P whilst complying with the SCCO’s requirements, until the E-bill is introduced. We will publish further information on this topic as soon as possible.
You can find out more about our services here or you can contact the Costs and Litigation Funding team at costs.support@clarionsolicitors.com.
