By the way | A thorny issue

My caseload is currently presenting me with some thorny issues. There is a particular privately paying client with whom I have been dealing for some time now. He has one of those soothing voices which one could listen to all day, and has always been most affable. His case went quiet for a time but recently blew up with renewed vigour, as they sometimes do. We have just achieved an excellent settlement for him but a sour note crept in when I mentioned the prospect of our final invoice. The only problems which I have previously encountered with him arose from the same subject matter. It seems that results are great, right up until the work which went into achieving them falls to be paid for.

A more classic problem in my line of work has reared its head on another file on which limitation will expire this month. The claimant needs to decide whether she really wants to pursue the matter, in which case she'll have to find the money to pay an after the event (ATE) insurance premium, or whether she would rather not bother. The claim itself is not of high value and the claimant has produced no convincing evidence to support her case.

Using a cost benefit analysis it made financial sense to put a settlement offer to the claimant. Our insurer client was keen but as is often the case, our insured client was not really on board. Their main concerns were that they consider the case to be a complete try-on, and they also have a significant policy excess which money they would have to pay over to the claimant in the event that a settlement is agreed. Handing over any cash in the circumstances would most certainly stick in their throat, and they would rather play chicken and see if the claimant does in fact issue proceedings against them. The insurers' problem with that, of course, is that an ATE premium would immediately be added to the claimant's already extortionate costs claim on issue, and it would be insurers who end up bearing the brunt of that.

The instructions from our insurer client, who is growing weary of spanners in the works, were effectively to remind the insured who was boss. Under the insurance policy, insurers have the power to take control of claims and run with them. The clear message was that if they don't like the inclination to try and settle, the insured can always withdraw the claim under the policy and fight the claimant with their own money. Watch this space.

Radio silence

I'm also experiencing some difficulties with my email traffic to three other solicitors, or so it would seem, as numerous messages carrying read receipts and marked as urgent have been met with a deafening radio silence. The later messages have been verging on diatribes as I appear to be the only one of four legal representatives who is taking the fast-approaching trial date seriously. The others have made a few noises about settlement meetings and the costs of preparing witness statements, but they are not doing anything proactive.

For the last two weeks running I have sent cross emails just before I have left the office for the weekend, proffering a simultaneous apology to the colleague who appears as my out of office contact during my Fridays off as I expected high-handed and even vitriolic messages by way of reply. Each time there was nothing.

I therefore resorted to the good old fashioned telephone. Unsurprisingly, all three solicitors were unavailable. They did however each ring me back that same day, which I have to admit I hadn't expected. One of them is a friend who commented that he'd noticed something of a tone to my more recent email - not that he'd done anything about it.

Having glanced at my computer screen while writing this article, I realised that my opponents are back to expected form, as the claimant's solicitor absolutely promised that we would have a breakdown of his six figure costs before close of business today. We've been asking for it for over six weeks, and only want an outline. I'm unsure what his definition of close of business is, but in my book it certainly precedes 6.45pm.

On the face of it

On another large group litigation case, my head is spinning with the number of takeovers and mergers which the various claimant firms have performed with each other in the past few months. The result is that most of the cases are now being handled in one place, which on the face of it makes perfect sense. I should however tell you that a number of the cases were recently discontinued with no explanation, meaning that the claimants are each liable for my client's costs. When we rang to request reasons for the discontinuances we were informed that the fee earner in question didn't know, as she "only write(s) the letters".

We were left wondering whether other members of the team lick the stamps - the mind boggles.