Contingency Fee Agreement

This page contains a copy of the Contingency Fee Agreement, a copy of which would be sent for you (the client) to sign and return upon application. It is a legally binding contract between you and Got-the-Boot.com of 27 Spon St, Coventry, CV1 3BA.

Sample Agreement

What is covered by this agreement

Your Employment Tribunal claim relating to your employment with
What is not covered by this agreement
- 2.1 Any counterclaim against you.
- 2.2 Any appeal you make or any appeal made by your opponent.
- 2.3 Any case which is subsequently listed by the Employment Tribunal for a hearing lasting more than one day.
Paying Us
- 3.1 If you win the case you pay us 33% of your damages plus any disbursements and vat at 17.5%. Please see below the meaning for damages.
- 3.2 Our agreement that you should pay 33% of your damages is based on our assessment of your claim - both whether you will win and its value. Our assessment assumes the case will be listed by the Tribunal for a hearing lasting no longer than one day. If there are additional hearings before the Tribunal such as Directions, Pre-Hearing Reviews or Preliminary Hearings where we are required to prepare for and attend on your behalf, the percentage of the damages which you will then pay us if we win the case is 50% plus disbursements but inclusive of VAT.
- 3.3 If you lose the case you do not pay us anything, except disbursements.
  
  NB: Disbursements are payments we make on your behalf to others involved in the case. We will notify you of disbursements incurred as we go along. We would expect the only disbursements to be traveling and subsistence expenses incurred in attending the tribunal hearing.
- 3.4 If you end the agreement before the case is won or lost, you are liable to pay our costs at the rate of £150 per hour with letters, telephone calls charged at £15 each unless they last for ten minutes or longer in which case they will be charged at the appropriate proportion of the hourly rate and letters received charged at £7.50 each. All of these figures attract VAT at the standard rate of 17.5%
  
  For what happens if we end the agreement before the case is won or lost, please refer to paragraph 5.
Damages

Damages means any money we recover on your behalf before deduction of any state benefits (such as income support, job seekers allowance) or any claim made against you by your employer (for example: repayment of a loan, relocation expenses or the cost of telephone calls etc.) Damages also include the financial value to you of any private health care, pension contributions, motor vehicle, etc). We will decide the financial value of these benefits to you.
Our Responsibilities

We must always act in your best interests in pursuing your claim for damages and obtaining for you the best possible results, subject to our duty to the tribunal; we must explain to you the risks and benefits of taking legal action; we must give you our best advice about whether to accept any offer of settlement.
Your Responsibilities

You must give us clear instructions which allow us to do our work properly; you must not ask us to work in an improper or unreasonable way; you must not deliberately mislead us; you must co-operate with us when asked; you must go to the tribunal hearing when asked; you must pay for disbursements as the case goes on.
What happens if you win

If you win (which means that your case is decided in your favour whether by a tribunal or an agreement to pay you damages) you pay us 33% of any damages plus any disbursements and vat (or 50% if there are any "additional hearings"). You agree that we may receive the damages your opponent has to pay. If your opponent refuses to accept our receipt, you will pay the cheque you receive into a joint bank account in your name and ours. Out of the money you agree to let us take 33% of the damages (50% if there are any "additional hearings") plus any outstanding disbursements. You take the rest. If your opponent fails to pay any damages owed to you we have the right to take recovery action in your name to enforce a judgment, order or agreement. The costs of this action are payable by you to us in addition to the 33% damages. It is possible, although rare, that the industrial tribunal will either reinstate or re-engage you in your original position or in another position working for your old employer. This award may be made alone or combined with an award of damages. For the purposes of deciding how much you have won for the purpose of calculating the 33%, an order for reinstatement or re-engagement will be valued as 3 months average pay of which we take 33% along with any other damages awarded.
What happens if you lose

If you lose you do not have to pay us anything, except our disbursements.
What happens when the agreement ends before the case itself ends

You can end the agreement at any time.

You are then liable to pay our costs incurred up to the date you end the agreement calculated at an hourly rate, set out above under "Paying Us".

We can end the agreement at any time

We have agreed to act on your behalf without payment unless we win or settle the case and this agreement has been made without knowledge of the pattern the case will follow before it ends. We are potentially acting for you without payment for our advice and assistance and we can therefore end the agreement at any time.

The following are examples (but not an exclusive list) of the circumstances which might lead us to end this agreement:-
1. If you do not keep to your responsibilities in paragraph 6. You are then liable to pay us our costs incurred up to the date the agreement ends calculated at the hourly rate and as specified under paragraph 3 above.
2. If we believe that you are unlikely to win and you disagree with us. You do not have to pay us anything.
3. If you reject our opinion about making a settlement with your opponent. You are then liable to pay us our costs incurred up to the date the agreement ends (unless the damages you negotiate or are awarded are 20% more than the offer we advised you to accept in which case you do not have to pay us anything). The costs you will be liable to pay us will be calculated on the hourly rate specified under paragraph 3 above.
4. If the case is listed by the Tribunal for a hearing of longer than a day.
5. If the value of the case does not make it financially worthwhile to pursue.
6. If your opponent makes a counterclaim against you or makes allegations or produces evidence which in our opinion increase the risk of losing the case and we know longer believe that we should act for you on a "No win, No fee" basis.
In any circumstances where we end the agreement, we will explain our reasons to you in full and will discuss whether we are prepared to enter into a replacement agreement on different terms and, if not, what our normal professional charges would be to continue to act on your behalf.
What happens after the agreement ends

After the agreement ends we will apply to have our name removed from the record of the tribunal proceedings in which we are acting. We have the right to preserve our lien over any property of yours (including your full file of relevant documents) in our possession unless any money owed to us under this agreement is paid in full. This means we can keep your papers until you pay us in full.
Costs

Employment Tribunals have the power to award costs in limited circumstances. If we recover costs on your behalf they belong to us. In other words, if you win, you will pay us 33% of your damages (or 50% if there are any "additional hearings") whether or not we also recover any costs from your opponent.

If you lose and you are ordered to pay costs to your opponent, then those costs will be payable by you. The circumstances in which costs may be ordered against you are set out below.

The 2004 Tribunal Regulations provide that a Tribunal may make a Costs Order against a Claimant (or Respondent) where the paying party has in bringing the proceedings, or her or his representative has in conducting the proceedings acted vexatiously, abusively, disruptively or otherwise unreasonably, or the bringing or conducting of the proceedings by the paying party has been misconceived. The Tribunal may also make a costs order against a party who seeks an adjournment or postponement of a hearing.

A Tribunal may also make a Costs Order against a party who has not complied with a Tribunal Order or Practice Direction.

The amount of any costs order is limited to £10,000 under the Tribunal's own jurisdiction or in any sum (ie. over £10,000) as adjudged payable by a County Court on a detailed assessment of costs incurred.

This document would then be signed by the legal representative and the client.