PART 4.3—LEGAL COSTS Overview of Part 4.3 Part 4.3 seeks to reduce complaints about legal costs, by emphasising the importance of informed consent by consumers and introducing a duty on law practices to charge no more than fair and reasonable legal costs for legal services. Part 4.3 also seeks to ensure that consumer protections are targeted at those consumers who need them (by excluding commercial or government clients from the majority of the provisions, unless they contract into them) and to provide an accessible and efficient system of costs dispute resolution through costs assessment. The designated local regulatory authority is empowered to resolve certain complaints about legal costs under the costs dispute provisions in Chapter 5. Division 1—Introduction Section 169 sets out the objectives of Part 4.3, which are— to ensure that clients of law practices are able to make informed choices about their legal options and the costs associated with pursuing those options; and to provide that law practices must not charge more than fair and reasonable amounts for legal costs; and to provide a framework for assessment of legal costs. Section 170 provides that the majority of the consumer protection provisions contained in Part 4.3 do not apply to commercial or government clients (as defined in the section) or a third party payer who would be a commercial or government client if the third party payer were a client of the law practice concerned. The entities falling within the definition of commercial or government client are generally large commercial operators or government entities and are likely to be repeat purchasers of legal services. Subsection (2)(h) provides that the Uniform Rules may specify additional persons or classes or persons as commercial or government clients. Section 171 defines a an and third party payer, associated third party payer a for the purposes of the Law. non-associated third party payer Certain rights to cost disclosure and to apply for costs assessment are given to third party payers under Part 4.3.
PART 4.3—LEGAL COSTS Overview of Part 4.3 Part 4.3 seeks to reduce complaints about legal costs, by emphasising the importance of informed consent by consumers and introducing a duty on law practices to charge no more than fair and reasonable legal costs for legal services. Part 4.3 also seeks to ensure that consumer protections are targeted at those consumers who need them (by excluding commercial or government clients from the majority of the provisions, unless they contract into them) and to provide an accessible and efficient system of costs dispute resolution through costs assessment. The designated local regulatory authority is empowered to resolve certain complaints about legal costs under the costs dispute provisions in Chapter 5. Division 1—Introduction Section 169 sets out the objectives of Part 4.3, which are— to ensure that clients of law practices are able to make informed choices about their legal options and the costs associated with pursuing those options; and to provide that law practices must not charge more than fair and reasonable amounts for legal costs; and to provide a framework for assessment of legal costs. Section 170 provides that the majority of the consumer protection provisions contained in Part 4.3 do not apply to commercial or government clients (as defined in the section) or a third party payer who would be a commercial or government client if the third party payer were a client of the law practice concerned. The entities falling within the definition of commercial or government client are generally large commercial operators or government entities and are likely to be repeat purchasers of legal services. Subsection (2)(h) provides that the Uniform Rules may specify additional persons or classes or persons as commercial or government clients. Section 171 defines a third party payer, an associated third party payer and a non-associated third party payer for the purposes of the Law. Certain rights to cost disclosure and to apply for costs assessment are given to third party payers under Part 4.3.