PI Brief Update

MoJ: £500 Fee for RTA Portal Claims Up to £10K to Start by the End of April - Tim Kevan

28/02/13. £500 Basic fee by end of April. Despite vigorous opposition, the Justice Secretary has now announced the level and timetable for the changes to the RTA Portal Fees. Specifically, the fixed recoverable costs for RTA Portal claims up to £10,000 are to be reduced from the current figure of £1,200 down to £500 from the end of April this year.

Extension of Portal by end of July
What’s more, new protocols extending the scheme to £25,000 and also to EL/PL claims are to be implemented by the end of July this year. This will limit RTA Portal Fees for cases up to £25,000 to £800 and for EL/PL claims the figures will be £900 for lower-value cases and £1,600 for cases up to £25,000.

Taking account of referral fees
In arriving at their conclusions, the government said that they believed it was reasonable to consider the referral fee ban as relevant to costs. This was despite arguments that the referral fee ban would simply leave the need for alternative marketing costs which in effect needed to be taken into account. It should also be noted that there is an on-going judicial review of the proposals which is due to be heard very soon.

Fees for opinion on quantum
An extra detail of the response was that the government conceded that the cost of obtaining an opinion on quantum from either Counsel or a specialist solicitor should be recoverable where it can be justified.

You can read the full details of the government’s response here.

Tim Kevan

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