The rules on what solicitors may charge, how fees must be explained to clients, and the formalities that govern billing, recovery and disputes.
A retainer runs from the first estimate to the final bill, and the costs rules track its whole life. This chapter opens with what 'costs' covers, the divide between contentious and non-contentious business, and the main methods of charging, before examining conditional fee agreements and damages-based agreements with their formal requirements and caps on fees. It then turns to the duty to give costs information at the outset and keep it updated as the work develops, alongside consumer cancellation rights, money on account and interest on unpaid bills. The final sections deal with contentious business agreements, what makes a bill valid and enforceable, and the two routes by which a client can challenge it — assessment by the court and complaint to the Legal Ombudsman.
