Nigel Allison -v- Garvins LLP : Refund of £833.10 Success Fee

The companies I've had to deal with this past year regarding my insurance claim would I believe benefit massively by learning from your direct, honest and efficient approach to business and customer satisfaction, thanks again

Nigel Allison, 12th December 2019

Nigel came to us on 23/10/19 with concerns that he had been overcharged by Garvins LLP (trading as Garvins Law) of Wythenshawe, Manchester.

They had represented him in relation to a claim for damages following a road traffic accident on 02/12/18, dealt with in the RTA claims portal. Damages were agreed at £2,775 on or about 20/09/19 and Garvins deducted a total of £1,001.10, which was made up of a success fee of £833.10 including VAT and a premium for an "After the Event" insurance policy of £168.00.

We advised Nigel to request a formal bill, which he received on 30/10/19. The bill came to £7,238.94, but was limited in terms of the amount that they were asking Nigel to pay to the £1,001.10 that had already been deducted.

We made contact with Garvins on 13/11/19, requesting the file of papers and,  because we took the view that the way in which Garvins had calculated the success fee was incorrect, we made an offer to reduce the bill from £7,238.94 to £1,074.00 which would have resulted in a refund to Nigel of £743.10. 

On 20/11/19 Garvins rejected our offer but made what they described as the commercial decision to refund Nigel the whole of the success fee in the sum of £833.10. We must stress that Garvins were clear that, although they were refunding more than we had asked for, it did not amount to an admission that their costs were unreasonable.