Failure to anticipate work does not justify a revision to a costs budget (Seekings v Moores)

Article summary

Dispute Resolution analysis: This decision includes a comprehensive review and summary of earlier decisions in which comment was made on what may or may not represent a ‘significant development’ which justifies a revision to a budget. In this case, it was held that where a defendant failed to respond adequately to a Part 18 request, served prior to agreement of the costs budgets, the work entailed in dealing with the request, after the costs budgets had been agreed, was not a ‘significant development’ which justified the increase. The court held that the purported ‘significant developments’ should have been anticipated when the budget was drafted, had been caused by the defendant’s own poor conduct, and/or led to costs being incurred which were the subject of costs orders which had already been made. The defendant’s application to revise his budget therefore failed. Written by Alex Bagnall, technical manager at Total Legal Solutions.