In the law of legal costs, there has long been a distinction between a lump sum bill, of the kind generally given in the first instance by solicitors to clients with whom they have an ongoing working relationship, and an itemized bill which is usually given if a client wants a bit more detail in [...]

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The Legal Practice Act, 1996 still governs costs agreements in matters where instructions were first given prior to 12 December 2005 and bills rendered pursuant to them, even after that date, which was the commencement date for the Legal Profession Act, 2004: see cl.  3.1(1) of the second schedule to the Legal Profession Act, 2004.  [...]

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A well-known Melbourne solicitor sued his clients for $165,000 in fees for helping them buy a car dealership.  Six years after a dinner with the clients in St Kilda, he sued his dinner companions, claiming to have entered at the dinner into an oral agreement that he would receive 1% of the purchase price of [...]

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Masterton Homes Pty Ltd v Palm Assets Pty Ltd [2009] NSWCA 234 is a case about the construction of partly written and partly oral contracts, and the application of the parol evidence rule to them.  Justice of Appeal Campbell summarised the cases in one of those beautifully crafted little numbered lists that this little newspaper [...]

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Update, 8 March 2010: See also Pancarci v CVK & Co [1998] VLPT 10, a decision of Registrar Howell.  Judge Jane Campton appeared, and referred Mr Howell to a decision of Justice O’Bryan in Carroll v Young (delivered 16 January 1990 in Supreme Court proceedings numbered OR 108/89), which came to the same conclusion in [...]

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The plaintiff in Brott v Shtrambrandt [2009] VSC 467 is not having much luck.  First of all, he cut what he thought was a plea bargain in a professional misconduct prosecution only to have VCAT’s Legal Practice List increase by 50% the penalty he and the Law Insitute had agreed jointly to contend was appropriate, [...]

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My experience of working in and representing big firms is that they consider they have an entitlement to swap lawyers in and out of files, even if that involves the loss of accumulated knowledge and a need to spend time on (and therefore charge fees for) the newbie coming up to speed.  One of the [...]

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It costs about $290 to file an application to set aside a costs agreement under s. 3.4.32 of the Legal Profession Act, 2004 in VCAT.  It is not a step lightly to be taken.  Moreso than much of what goes on in VCAT, such applications are treated like litigation in a court.  Costs will be [...]

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There is no excerpt because this is a protected post.

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Recently, the County Court’s Practice Court accepted that where a client admitted having received a bill given by email, service in accordance with the Legal Practice Act, 1996 had been effected, so that various deadlines which are counted from that date then commenced to run.  That is so even though the commencement of the running [...]

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