Hi Rob


As a layman I would interpret that as the company was willing to settle out of court if you withdraw your court action against them by the time and date noted? And if you did withdraw the case by that time and date they would not pursue any court costs incurred by them either? 


I'm not entirely au fait with the workings of courts though... ?

They want you to pull out. They are offering to settle, and to not pursue you for their costs.


They are reminding you that if they win, you could also become liable to pay their costs - the other parties solicitors fees, and perhaps incidentals like postage, photocopying, time they took off work to prepare their case etc, as well as all yours of course..


This offer says, if you withdraw, then they promise to pay up, and  not to pursue you for those costs. - this is a bargaining tactic, to make it sound like, decide now, get a better deal.


If, and only if (be honest here) you can be confident you will win, then there is not much point in agreeing to  this, as it is far more likely that if you win, you will also want to try and recover some or all of your costs from them.

Unless your own costs are small, and you would value the speedy expedition, then go for it.


Someone pays for the court hearing and the solicitors, it is rarely 'knock for knock', and more often than  not the loser pays.

So Judge decides in favour of party X against party Y the original amount claimed plus full costs, or plus £500 towards costs, or whatever.


Unless the Judge thinks it is a silly case, but for some  legal subtelty he cannot throw it out, in which case he may decide not to award costs, or to award some de-mimis token amount. (as an example, that sometimes occurs with arguing neighbours who the judge decides are really as bad as each other, so he might decide in favour of X but only awards £1 or something, to give a hollow victory, as a way to tell both parties not to be so silly in future, as both have now wasted efforts and have  got legal fees to pay, and not a lot to show for it)



I appreciate you may well not wish to, but if you can give more info, it may be possible to be more specific.



edit, also, it seems they want you not just to withdraw, but to travel back in time to do so.



For your more general education,    part 38 of the Civil Procedure Rules is  here in all its glory

38.6 is also worth a read.

I tried going after a budget airline for compensation after some bad treatment, but their legal budget and smoke & mirrors are better than mine, and that, it seems, is all that counts. Have you the budget to gamble on winning? They have.

Rob EAGLE (Straw Poll)


Firstly  am an "EX Plod" (25yrs) so am more leaning towards Non Civil - which this is :-

However - The first Line is basic !! an offer to settle YOUR claim in FULL  - BUT with "STRINGS ATTACHED"


1) YOU are requested to "STOP" any further Acton(s) in pursuance of YOUR (Plaintive) claim against their "DEFENDANT"


2) IF YOU AGREE !! (By the Time indicated) - then the DEFENDANT will NOT ask YOU for DAMAGES (an Automatic entitlement) apparently !!


SO in a Nutshell YOU need to Study CPR 38.6 which is a clause (Court) allowing reasonable cost(s) to the DEFENDANT !!

These cost(s) BEWARE should be LESS than your DAMAGES

BUT BEWARE

When you ALLOW the CLAIM to be "Discontinued - IN FULL"

I believe you remove/erode any right to a  "Full Liability" claim !!


In other words they are worried you can still come back at them - rather like a "gagging clause"

They want you to "take the money" BUT that`s it

You cannot run around telling every one it was the Plaintiffs Fault etc etc


HOWSZAT

PS I will keep on studying 18th much easier !!

What is the date on the letter you received from them?


It seems impossible to comply with the request as stated by 4pm on 14th June 2019 as it is now the 2nd of December 2019, so unless you did as they requested back at the beginning of June they need to send another letter correctly dated giving you time to act on it.


Regards taking on "The Big Boys", many years ago when I was involved in kitchen fitting on a daily basis I paid attention to things that went on in and around the trade. There was a kitchen fitted by B&Q using sub-contractors in Cheltenham, that I had nothing to do with, that took several weeks to complete.


The customer took B&Q to court, their story was that they had bought the house for their son, however as it took a couple of months to finally get the kitchen snagged and tidied up they wanted to claim against B&Q including an amount for loss of rental income.


B&Q sent a solicitor and a barrister to the small claims court to point out that in the contract there was not a agreed date by which the work had to be completed, therefore B&Q was not in breach of contract. The customers claim was dismissed, then the customer had to pay for the solicitor and the barrister.


At this point the story got into the local paper, the customer was absolutely outraged that B&Q had sent a barrister to the small claims court and they had to pay the barristers bill on top of the solicitors and the other bills, they felt they had been done over by B&Q.


The truth was that B&Q simply could not afford to lose the case as it would have opened the way to claims against them that would add up to a lot of money, so paying for a barrister to attend the small claims court was insignificant to them whether they won or lost the case.


Andy B.

Following on from what Buffer has said about full and final, it used to be common practice for insurance companies and others to rubber stamp the back of cheques saying that the cheque could only be paid into your account if you signed the back of it acknowledging that it was all the money you were going to get and you would not try to pursue any further claims.


Then the company who issued the cheque would have it sent back to them by the bank to put on file.


Andy B.

Thank you Andy,


Don't worry about the date, I am just wanting to see how others interpret what is written and what it means to them.


Rob

In that case, you get the money in full, then pay your own legal fees and they pay their own legal fees.


Andy B.

Like the others, I read it as they are willing to pay you the claim in full, provided you cancel the court action by the set date.  If you do that, they will not pursue you for their costs, which they could normally do if you were the one to drop the claim.  The only bit of weasel wording that worries me is that they only state that they are "willing" to pay the claim.  There is no actual undertaking that they will pay out if you drop the claim.


Is this one of those questions where the asker keeps asking the question until they get the answer they want to hear, then they accept that answer and move on?

I am expecting a twist in the tale with things not progressing as anticipated.


Andy B.