We are happy to discuss any new enquiry over the telephone for up to 15 minutes. Thereafter we offer a fixed fee for an initialconsultation of 1 hour for £150 plus VAT (£180) or £100 + VAT (£120) for a newly qualified Solicitor.  At this meeting we discuss history of your dispute and brieflygo through the relevantdocuments to give you general advice. This will include relevant procedure, the issues, the meritstaking into account recoverability and evidence availableand costs of bringing or defending any claim.

Employment Law

Employee – making a claim for unfair or wrongful dismissal

For a straight forward unfair or wrongful dismissal claim that does not involve any other heads of loss such as discrimination,our fees would be in the region of £3,000 to £9,000 plus 20% VAT.

For a case that would be classed as medium complexity for example, if there are a large number of witnesses and/or documents, if applications are made or defended during proceedings, if it is an automatic unfair dismissal claim such asthe dismissal was as a result of blowing the whistle on your employer, or the claim involves other allegations of discrimination, our fees would be in the region of £7,000 to £12,000 plus 20% VAT.

A highly complex case which involvesin addition to the above, several factors of discrimination,making or defending costs applications or there are preliminary issues such as disability that need to be determined before the Final Hearing, our fees would be in the region of £10,000 to £25,000 plus 20% VAT.

In addition to the above, our costs for attending a Tribunal Hearing are between£1200 to £1800 plus 20% VAT a day. The length of the hearing could range from 1 to 5 days depending on how complex your case is.

Disbursements

These are costs related to your matter that are payable to a third party such as Counsel’s fees for advising and/or attending a Tribunal Hearing including preparationwould range from £500 to £4,000 plus 20% VAT per day depending on the level of experience of the barrister.

For employers – defending a claim for unfair or wrongful dismissal

If you are defending a claim brought by a former employee our pricing for defending the claims for unfair or wrongful dismissal ranges is slightly more than that above. This is because it will be necessary to determine the merits of the claim, the response to each allegation made, obtaining documentary and witness evidence to support the response therefore our pricing is as follows:

For a straight forward unfair or wrongful dismissal claim that does not involve any other heads of loss such as discrimination would be in the region of £3,500 to £12,000 plus 20% VAT.

For a case that would be classed as medium complexity for example, if there are a large number of witnesses and/or documents, if applications are made or defended during proceedings, if it is an automatic unfair dismissal claim, or the claim involves other allegations of discrimination, our fees would be in the region of £9,000 to £18,000 plus 20% VAT.

Highly complex case which involve several factors of discrimination as well as unfair or wrongful dismissal, costs applications or dealing with preliminary issues such as whether the Claimant has a disability if it is not agreed by the parties, fees for such a case would be in the region of £15,000 to £30,000 plus 20% VAT.

There will be additional charges for attending a Tribunal Hearing of £1200 to £1800 a day plus 20% VAT.  Length of hearing vary and could range from 1 to 5 days depending on how complex the claim is.

The fees set out above cover all of the work in relation to key stages of the claim that is made which include:

• Taking your initial instructions, reviewing the papers and advising you on merits and likely compensation and matters for defence.  This is likely to be revisited throughout the matter and may subject to change.  If further research is required into the issues, this can be incorporated into the fixed fee initial consultation and would be in the region of £350 to £500 plus VAT.

• Enter into pre-claim conciliation. This is required to explore whether a settlement can be reached.

• Preparing or defending the claim.

• Reviewing and advising on your claimor response filed from your employer.

• Reviewing and advising on the claim made and filing the response.

• Exploring  settlement and negotiating settlement throughout the process.

• Preparing or considering a Schedule of Loss, preparing for and attending a Preliminary Hearing.

• Exchanging documents with the other party and agreeing a bundle of documents.

• Taking witness statements, drafting statements and agreeing their content with witnesses and serving.

• Preparing bundle of documents.

• Reviewing, advising on the other party’s witness statements.

• Agreeing  a list of issues, chronology and/or cast list.

• Preparation and attendance at Final Hearing, including instructing Counsel and travel to and from court.

The list above details some examples as to the work that will be required in conducting your matter.  Not all of the stages will be relevant and the fees therefore could be reduced.  It may be that you would like to handle the claim itself and only have our advice in relation to some of the stages or helping you to prepare documents and we would be happy to agree fees for this with you based on your individual needs.

How long will my matter take?

It is always difficult to accurately estimate the time that it will take for your matter to conclude as this is highly depending on the other party’s approach and both parties decide to reach a resolution.  In taking your initial instructions to final resolution of your matter will depend largely on the stage at which your case is resolved.  If for example settlement is reached during the pre-claim conciliation i.e. during initial negotiations without having to issue court proceedings, your case is likely to take 4 to 12 weeks.  If however your claim proceeds to a Final Hearing, your case could take 8 to 18 months depending on availability of court and timely compliance with court orders and directions.  Of course this is just a rough estimation and we will be able to give you a more accurate time scale once we have more information and as your matter will progress.

Some key stages of contested employment claim would be:-

• The claim form outlining your case and nature of the dispute (Form ET1)
• The response form when a claim has been made against you (Form ET3)
• The document that sets out the factual details of your claim, and the legal basis for brining your claim against your employer (Particulars of Claim).
• If you do not comply with an Order made by the Employment Tribunal you risk losing part (or all) of your claim (the making an Unless Order).
• A provisional decision given during the course of the legal action (interlocutory applications).

Debt Recovery

We are happy to discuss any new enquiry over the telephone for up to 15 minutes. Thereafter we offer a fixed fee for an initial consultation of 1 hour for £150 plus VAT (£180) or £100 + VAT (£120) for a newly qualified Solicitor.  At this meeting we discuss history of your dispute and briefly go through the relevant documents to give you general advice.  This will include relevant procedure, the issues, the merits taking into account recoverability and evidence available and costs of bringing or defending any claim.

Whether you are an individual or a business seeking to recover the debt owed to you we are able to assist in providing you with clear advice as to the process of recovery and the merits of making a claim.

Where your claim is relation to an unpaid invoice that is not disputed or cannot be defended and enforcement action is not needed after judgment, the costs applicable are as follows:

• Value of the debt is up to £5,000. The Court fee for the claim if issued on paper will be up to £205 depending on the value of the claim.  If the claim is filed online, the fee will be up to £185.  Our fees will be between £400 to £2500plus VAT (£480 to £960).

• Value of the debt is £5100 to £10000. The Court fee for the claim if issued on paper will be up to £455.  If the claim is filed online, the fee will be up to £410.  Our fees will be between £800 to £6000 plus VAT.

• Value of the debt is £10,001 to £100,000.  The Court fee for the claim if issued on paper will be 5% of the value of the claim.  If issued on paper the fee is 4.5% of the value of the claim. Our fees would be in the region of £5,000 to £65,000 plus VAT.

You should also note that if the defending party is a litigant in person your costs will likely be more.

You should note that if you would like to proceed with a claim that it is unlikely that the VAT element of our fees will be recovered from your debtor.  Your claim may be increased depending on whether interest and compensation is available to be claimed on top of the original debt amount. This may take the debt into higher branding, with a higher cost.  The costs quoted above are not for matters where enforcement action such as bailiff action is needed to collect your debt.

The fees set out above include the following:-

• Taking your instructions and reviewing documentation.
• Undertaking appropriate searches.
• Sending a letter before action.
• Receiving payment and sending onto you, if the debt is not paid, drafting and issuing a claim on your behalf.
• Where no Acknowledgement of Service or Defence is received, applying to the court to enter judgment in default.
• When Judgment in Default is received, write to the other side to request payment.
• If payment is not received within 28 days, providing you with advice for next steps and likely costs going forward.

Disbursements

These are costs related to your matter that are payable to a third party such as Counsel’s fees for advising and/or attending hearings including preparation would range from £700 to £4,000 plus 20% VAT per day depending on the level of experience of the barrister.

It is difficult to predict how long your matter could take.  Usually straight forward debt recovery matters would take up to 24 weeks from receipt of your instructions for you to receive payment from the debtor if court proceedings are not required to be issued.

Should court proceedings needs to be issued to recover your debt your matter could take 6 to 24 months depending on court availability and progress of the claim and response from the debtor.  Please also note that if enforcement action is needed, the matter will take longer to resolve.

Should the matter be defended then we would be happy to agree fixed fees for the various stages of litigation which include advising you on the Defence, completing Directions Questionnaires, agreeing directions with the other party, instructing counsel if necessary, preparation of disclosed documents, preparation of witness statements, attendance at small claim trial (approximately 2 hours) or fast track trial (1 day).  If your claim is above £25,000 it is likely that it will be issued to the Multi-track where costs in preparation of documents are likely to cost more.