PI Brief Update

The Limits of Solicitor-Own-Client Assessments and ATE Commission Disclosure - Maia Cohen, Temple Garden Chambers

25/10/26. In Turner v Coupland Cavendish Limited [2026] EWCA Civ 1204, the Court of Appeal held that a former client could not use the Solicitor-Own-Client Assessments (SOCA) under Section 70 of the Solicitors Act 1974 (“the 1974 Act”), in conjunction with a Part 18 request, as a means to elicit information from their solicitors about possible commissions received on an ATE policy.

As per rule 16.1 of the SRA Financial Services (Conduct of Business) Rules, and in accordance with their fiduciary duties, it is incumbent upon a solicitor to inform a client if they receive a commission fee from the ATE insurer. The Appellant firm of solicitors refused to answer questions put to them on behalf of their former client, the Respondent, as to whether such a fee was received.

As such, the Respondent brought Part 8 proceedings under CPR 67.3, for the assessment of the Solicitor’s bill of costs pursuant to s70(1) of the 1974 Act. The Respondent sought an order that the Solicitors provide an answer to their CPR Part 18 Request (“The Request”) for Further Information, which queried:

“Was any direct payment (whether by way of commission, discount, rebate, referral or marketing fee or otherwise) received by you from the ATE insurer or an insurance intermediary (or any associate of theirs)?”

When considering whether such an order could be made, the Court of Appeal examined whether, as per the threshold condition in CPR Part 18, the Request related to “a matter which is in dispute in the proceedings”.

The Respondent was seeking an order for an assessment of the Solicitors’ bill, and the claim form requested an assessment of the Appellant’s profit costs and success fee only. ATE insurance is not a disbursement and therefore cannot be included in the solicitor’s bill of costs but will appear as an item on the solicitor’s cash account, which constitutes a record of all monetary transactions conducted by a solicitor on behalf of a client during the course of a retainer. The cash account itself cannot form part of a SOCA, but stands as evidence by which the costs judge can certify the final amount to be paid to or by the solicitor in respect of the bill and the costs of the assessment.

The Court of Appeal thereby held that the costs judge will only be concerned with the entries in the cash account which identify how much the solicitor has already paid towards the bill. Other entries or alleged omissions were irrelevant to the task the costs judge is performing. A dispute as to whether the solicitor received a secret commission is not and could never be a dispute in the proceedings. The Part 18 request was therefore illegitimate, and there was no power to direct a response to it.

Notwithstanding this finding, the Court of Appeal recognised the unattractiveness of the Respondent’s position, stating that a solicitor ought to tell a client about an ATE commission fee if they ask, but acknowledging that where a solicitor refuses to answer the query, “there appears to be no easy and cost-effective means of countering such recalcitrance”. There is no shortcut for a client in the Respondent’s position to commence proceedings for an account or to complain to the Legal Ombudsman if the solicitor refuses to answer questions on the subject.

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