Employment law and HR pricing transparency

Pricing transparency

Employment tribunal

Quality assured: Wright Hassall is Lexcel accredited, the Law Society’s legal practice quality mark for practice management and client care.

The cost of running a tribunal depends on the complexity of the case: *complex cases involving a range of claims, multiple witnesses and extended documentation will, inevitably, cost more than routine or straightforward cases that concern one single claim, fewer witnesses and less documentation.

What is involved in taking a case to tribunal?

Representing an employer:  An employer defending a claim from an employee for unfair dismissal or discrimination will have to invest more time and money than the employee, even if the case is straightforward. This is because more people are involved (in the investigation and hearing stages) and an employer will have more contractual documentation to be reviewed. Employers also need to remember when defending a discrimination claim that, if the tribunal finds against them, compensation payments are uncapped.

Representing an employee: An employee bringing a case for unfair dismissal or discrimination is likely to have less contractual paperwork to sift through and there are usually fewer witnesses involved (for instance those carrying out the investigation will appear on behalf of the employer, not the employee). Therefore, the overall cost may be lower than that for an employer; nonetheless the complexity of the issues involved will determine the final cost.

The example fees set out below cover all of the work in relation to the following key stages of the claim:

• Taking your initial instructions, reviewing the papers and advising you on merits and likely compensation (this is likely to be revisited throughout the matter and subject to change)
• Entering into pre-claim conciliation where this is mandatory to explore whether a settlement can be reached
• Preparing claim or response
• Reviewing and advising on claim or response from other party
• Exploring settlement and negotiating settlement throughout the process
• Preparing or considering a schedule of loss
• Preparing for (and arranging representation at) a Preliminary Hearing
• Exchanging documents with the other party and agreeing a bundle of documents
• Taking witness statements, drafting statements and agreeing their content with witnesses
• Preparing bundle of documents
• Reviewing and advising on the other party’s witness statements
• Agreeing a list of issues, a chronology and/or cast list
• Preparation and attendance at Final Hearing, including instructions to Counsel

The details

The indicative prices outlined below are based on a tribunal case being run with a combination of junior and senior lawyers whose time will be apportioned depending on the complexity of the case.

The key differentiator between a ‘straightforward’, ‘medium complexity’ or ‘high ‘complexity’ tribunal case is where there are an increased number of claims being raised or defended, for example an unfair dismissal case would be considered as high complexity where there are additional allegations of discrimination and whistleblowing. Where there are additional and more complex claims to consider, additional time is required to consider each of the claims, which is reflected in the increased fees.

In all instances, the work undertaken for each case is summarised in the bullet points captured above.  Our service would include all necessary steps to prepare the employer to defend their tribunal case, or the employee to bring their claim to tribunal.  The indicative prices do not include costs payable to a third party, such as a barrister.

Indicative fee scale

NB: the costs outlined below are based on our hourly rates (which vary according to the seniority of the lawyer involved) and the price range reflects the complexity of a case and apply to both employees and employers. 

Average range of prices (plus VAT charged at 20%)

	From	To
Straightforward case	£10,000	£15,000
	Above range is based on our hourly rates: £185 - £325 (plus VAT charged at 20%)
Medium complexity case	£15,000	£20,000
	Above range is based on our hourly rates: £185 - £325 (plus VAT charged at 20%)
High complexity case	£20,000	£45,000
	Above range is based on our hourly rates: £185 - £325 (plus VAT charged at 20%)

The above prices exclude costs payable to a third party, such as a barrister. The disbursements payable will be the use of counsel (barrister) to attend the tribunal. Barristers’ rates vary according to their year of call. During any matter, we will liaise with Chambers on your behalf in order to secure a range of fee estimates for Barristers’ whose experience would match the complexity of the case, for you to decide who to instruct.

Timescales On average it takes approximately 12 months from lodging a claim to the tribunal hearing but this timing is wholly dependent on the directions set by the Tribunal and the hearing date. The tribunal will list the hearing and cases can be listed for 1 – 5 days (or more) depending on the number of witnesses and complexity of the claim before it.

Preliminary Review of case	Price (plus VAT charged at 20%)
Initial conversation to discuss the scope of a claim (including review of any claim form or response) It is likely that other documentation will need to be reviewed prior to such a call, and we can provide a quote for such a review based on the volume of documentation relevant to the matter.	£350-500

You can find out more about the status of your claim, and what constitutes fair process, by checking the ACAS Code of Practice on the ACAS website.