The areas of work in which we have particular expertise, experience and excellence.
The areas of work in which we have particular expertise, experience and excellence.
News | Wed 7th Jan, 2015
With the new year come predictions as to what will happen in 2015. Tom Standage of the Economist predicts that our smart phones will become smarter with the use of anticipatory or predictive intelligence – our phones may suggest we leave earlier for a dinner date if the traffic is bad or offer sending a message to other participants if we are late for meetings. Paul Lee of Deloittes predicts drones will be used more by business, Neil Murray of Mimecast unsurprisingly thinks that internet security will become an even greater issue and Simon Culmer thinks more customer service will be provided by video. These are some predictions from the technology of business pundits*. What of the law?
It may be folly to make any predictions as to changes to the law but I would nonetheless hazard a guess that costs budgeting will either be abolished or reformed in 2015. Some judges are open in their dislike of costs budgeting whilst others betray their views more subtly in comments or general demeanour. Cost budget hearings must take up a large amount of court time and it is questionable whether they are looked at again in many cases before detailed assessment takes place (if indeed it does). Whereas in the past directions might have been agreed between the parties or dealt with briefly at a telephone CMC in multi track cases they are now dealt with at lengthy CCMC’s. Large numbers of cases settle before getting to trial and in those cases the budgeting process adds to the use of court time and the costs incurred unnecessarily.
The Costs Budgeting procedure has provided the legal profession with additional tasks for which we can bill and it has thrown a lifeline to costs draftsmen in the Jackson era. If costs budgeting is abolished or reformed the alternative may well be more predictive costs. It may be that costs budgeting will be retained for much higher value multi track claims but a predictive costs regime for those with a lower value. I wonder what my smart phone has to say about the matter…
