Fees

OUR MOTORING CASES FEES

Some driving offences are so serious that you may be able to obtain a legal aid certificate to cover our costs in representing you if you are financially eligible. These tend to be the cases that are likely to carry custody.

In relation to other motoring matters, we have one of the most experienced in-house advocacy teams in the country who are able to represent you in the Magistrates Court or the Crown Court.

We do not undertake work on these sorts of cases on an hourly basis, but on a fixed costs basis, subject to the complexity of the case or as it develops.

The price includes:

• Considering evidence and up to 2 hours attendance/preparation, including:
• Taking instructions
• Providing advice in relation to plea and likely sentence
• Where you cannot anticipate the likely sentence, advice on the options available to the court in relation to sentencing
• Where appropriate, advice on whether an exceptional hardship, or special reasons argument should be made
• Representation at a single hearing
• We will also advise on appeal as part of the fixed fee

Where the case involves the taking of witness statements, there may be a further fee which we will agree in advance.

The fee will not include the instruction of expert witnesses. We have a range of experts we instruct and will endeavour to obtain such services at a reasonable cost.

A fixed fee of £500 plus VAT covers hearings that will resolve with one attendance at court including an exceptional hardship hearing.

Cases that require a trial hearing because the offence is denied or a special reasons hearing (where it is argued that the circumstances of the offence give rise to a situation where potentially no penalty points or disqualification should be imposed) carry a fixed fee of £1,000 plus VAT.

In trial cases and special reasons cases, the fee includes taking witness statements and advice on appeal.

The key stages of your case are likely to be broadly:

• Meet with your solicitor to provide instructions on what happened.
• We will consider initial disclosure, and any other evidence and provide advice.
• Arranging to take any witness statements if necessary (this will have an additional cost of £75 plus VAT per witness).
• We will explain the court procedure to you, so you know what to expect on the day of your hearing, and the sentencing options available to the court.
• We will conduct any further preparatory work, obtain further instructions from you if necessary and answer any follow up queries you have.
• We cannot generally provide precise details of what time beyond morning or afternoon in most cases of when your hearing will take place, as this depends on the court listing for that day.
• We will attend court on the day and meet with you before going into court. We anticipate being at court for up to half a day.
• We will discuss the outcome with you. If advice is required on appeal, this will not carry an additional cost.

Most driving cases are relatively straightforward and fall into the above brackets. In more complex cases that are likely to require substantially more work, we will agree fixed fees in advance to cover the whole cost of the case or each stage that arises.

We are afraid that we are unable to guarantee that a case will be reached in the Court’s list on any particular day or that the case might not go off for other reasons beyond our control and if this requires a further attendance at court then a further fee may become due depending on the circumstances of the case.