This advanced guide should be used in conjunction with the Electronic Civil Finance Handbook, available for download here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/funding-and-costs-assessment-for-civil-and-crime-matters
This advanced guide details ways for providers to avoid the most common reasons for a secondary request or document request following submission of an Interim or Final Bill.
- CCMS will generate an initial documents required action based on what has been claimed within the bill.
- Supporting evidence required to claim has changed very little between paper-based claims and CCMS.
- Repeated requests for information that do not progress the claim can lead to the rejection of the claim or outcome.
- Requesting further information on a claim causes delays to payments and additional work for providers. Following these tips will help get it right first time.
Expert’s Details Insufficient
The detail required on expert’s invoices has not changed since June 2011 and a voucher must be provided for all disbursements of £20.00 or over (inclusive of VAT). Common issues include:
- A breakdown of the work done and the hourly rate claimed must be provided. This is to ensure work is not claimed above the codified rates. Where an expert is paid an hourly rate, submitting a claim for a lump sum cannot be accepted.
- Experts must provide travel details so the amounts claimed can be verified as being correct. Details on where the expert has travelled from and to are required, ideally using a post code, but summary locations are acceptable. Train tickets do not need to be provided, but confirmation if the expert travelled by train is helpful.
- Where only submitting the minimum evidence (a ledger, for example), this should be justified with a note. This could be, for example, full evidence not available due to the case being historic.
Counsel Fees Do Not Reconcile
Any costs allocated to counsel to claim under the Family Advocacy Scheme (FAS)
must match the final amount claimed by counsel. You can check how much costs
remain allocated to counsel prior to submitting the claim on the Case Statement of Account screen. The Total Counsel Cost Ceiling line will show the full amount
allocated to counsel. The Counsel Cost Ceiling Remaining line will show the amount of costs remaining on counsel’s costs limit. It should read £0.00.
In the above example, counsel has been allocated £591.74, but has been authorised payment of £493.12. This has left £98.12 for counsel. Before the bill is submitted, an amendment request to reduce counsel’s costs allocation to £493.12 should be submitted if there are no further bills to be submitted from counsel.
Please refer to the Quick Guide for Amending Counsel Costs limitation. You should note that counsel’s costs allocation is net only and should not include VAT.
LAA requires the balancing of costs remaining to counsel to be £0.00. This is to ensure that there are no further claims from counsel.
Once the Final Bill is paid to the provider, CCMS will initiate the closing process for the certificate and once this is completed, counsel will not be able to submit any further claims, even if they have not yet submitted their claim.
Outcomes Incomplete
Until the Outcome is completed, CCMS will not release the bill for processing. Outcomes that need to be redone, for example, Statutory Charge or Inter Partes information missed off, should be requested to be ‘cleared’ and submitted afresh. This can be done by a Case or Billing Enquiry.
Where a second Outcome is submitted without the original being cleared, LAA will only receive a blank Outcome that will not contain the required amended information. This will cause delays as LAA will have to clear the original Outcome and then reject the second Outcome to be resubmitted.
- Outcomes must be submitted on all proceedings on a certificate before the Final Bill option will appear.
- You may submit outcomes when each proceeding concludes or all together at the end of the case.
- Legal Help figures should be entered on the Outcome for the relevant proceeding.
- If the Statutory Charge applies, LAA will require a completed CIV ADMIN1 form uploaded to CCMS. Complete the CIV ADMIN1 whenever there is money or property involved, even if you do not believe the Statutory Charge will apply if LAA are unable to make a final decision, the claim will be rejected and ultimately payment refused.
Solicitor Travel Details Required
Travel details should be provided so that claims can be verified as accurate and within the rules on ‘local travel’ to court.
- Mileage is capped at 45ppm. Post codes or locations of travel should be provided.
- When travelling by a route other than the most direct route, an explanation should be provided: for example, ‘To avoid busy motorway’ or ‘roadworks on normal route’. LAA is unlikely to have local knowledge of any journey.
- Any public transport over £20.00 must be evidenced with a ticket. An office ledger is sufficient for mileage claims.
- Any travel by taxi should be accompanied with a justification to why it was more appropriate than public transport.
- When travelling for a reason other than attending at court, a justification should be provided so LAA can check it is within the published guidelines.
Case Narrative Required
All claims should be accompanied with a case narrative. This is to give an overview of the work undertaken so the assessment can be completed. The case narrative does not need to be an uploaded document, it can also be a response to the default Document Request in CCMS.
Even nil bills will need a case narrative. This could be ‘this is the associated case’ or an explanation for any nil bill submitted where there has been full costs recovery and no claim is being made from the Fund.
The case narrative can also be used to draw LAA’s attention to any usual aspects of a claim.
LAA Civil Claim Fix
Whenever you disagree with an LAA decision to return your claim, you can challenge our decision through LAA’s Civil Claim Fix process.
This is for where you believe:
- the information requested is not required; or
- the information requested has already been uploaded.
Challenges should lay out the reasons for disagreeing and be sent to
LAACivilClaimFix@justice.gov.uk
You can also contact this service for advice on any situation you are unsure of to avoid having a claim returned for more information.