Our Fees

From the commencement of Caddick Davies Solicitors as a specialist motoring law firm over 14 years ago, we have prided ourselves in making specialist and high quality legal representation accessible and affordable to anyone facing a Motoring Offence Investigation or Prosecution.

We have a cost to fit all pockets and our main emphasis will always be on adding value to your case. When we speak to you, if we don’t believe that we can add value or that it is not right for you to have legal representation we will not accept your case – That is our promise!

We believe in cost certainty and transparency in determining our fees. At the outset of your case we will provide you with an assessment of the fees in your case. There will be no hidden costs or surprises at the conclusion of your case.

Where possible, we operate a fixed fee system and will agree the fee with you in advance of your case. This provides you with certainty that your case will not cost you anymore than agreed and allows us to concentrate upon the task of obtaining a successful outcome on your behalf.

In all cases we aim to provide a Single Fixed Fee and to avoid “Staged Fixed Fees”, so that our Clients know at the outset what the final cost will be.

In all cases we will discuss payments with you and make sure that representation is affordable as we are here to act in Your Best Interests. We will discuss payment options with you, including allowing time to pay by instalments. For instance if your case is going to last over a number of months we will be happy to discuss payments by instalments over an agreed period.

Our Fixed Fees:

As a specialist motoring law firm having been established for over 14 years and having an established reputation within the legal profession within the field of Road Traffic Law, we believe in being accessible to all and pride ourselves in our competitive fixed fees.  These fees are reflective of the level of experience, expertise and effort that we put into securing positive outcomes for our Clients.

Whilst every case is different and therefore there will be some variance in our fixed fees (in cases which have additional complexities or specific needs), below you will find an example of our Fixed Fees for Summary Only Magistrates’ Court Motoring Matters.

All of these fixed fees are provided as plus VAT which we are required to charge at a rate of 20%.

All motoring offences (excluding drink driving related offences):

• Guilty Plea and Mitigation (without attending court) – this will apply if you have committed a minor motoring offence (e.g. a lower level speeding offence) and want to enter a Guilty Plea and minimise the penalty (fine and penalty points without attending court – £600.00 (plus VAT)
• Guilty Plea and Mitigation (with representation at court) – this will apply if you have committed a more serious motoring offence and want to enter a Guilty Plea and to minimise your sentence or achieve a specific outcome (e.g. if you are facing possible disqualification from driving or you are a new driver) and includes one of our Solicitors or Barristers attending court to represent you – £1500.00 (plus VAT)
• Guilty Plea and Exceptional Hardship (with representation at court) – this will apply if you have committed a motoring offence and that as a result of any penalty points that the court may impose you face being disqualified from driving for 6 months (or more) on the grounds of your accumulation of 12 or more penalty points (known as “totting up”). This includes one of our Solicitors or Barristers attending court – £1500 – £2000 (plus VAT)
• Guilty Plea and Special Reasons (with representation at court) – this will apply if you have committed a motoring offence (excluding “drink driving” related offences and you wish to argue that there were “circumstances special to the offence” (e.g. if you were driving without insurance and did not know that you were uninsured) such that the court can exercise its discretion not to endorse penalty points – £1500 – £1750 (plus VAT)
• Not Guilty Plea and Trial (with representation at court) – this will apply if you are accused of a motoring offence (e.g. Using a mobile phone or Failing to provide driver information) and wish to enter a Not Guilty Plea and challenge the prosecution case against you at trial. This fee includes representation at court by one of our Solicitors or Barristers – £1500 – £2000 (plus VAT)

Drink Driving related offences:

• Guilty Plea and Mitigation for Drink Driving or Failing to Provide an Evidential Specimen (with representation at court) – this will apply if you  wish to enter a Guilty Plea to a charge of Drink Driving or Failing to Provide an Evidential Specimen and you wish to minimise the sentence that the court imposes (including minimising the punishment and length of the disqualification imposed) – £1500 (plus VAT) (cases resolved at one hearing) and £2100 (plus VAT) (cases resolved at two hearings)
• Guilty Plea and Special Reasons Application for Drink Driving (with representation at court) – this will apply if you accept a drink driving offence but have grounds to argue that the court should not impose a mandatory period of disqualification (e.g. on the grounds of shortness of distance driven, emergency or “laced drinks”) – £4000 (plus VAT) to £5000 (plus VAT) 
• Not Guilty Plea and Trial for Drink Driving (with representation at court) – this will apply if you do not accept that you were “drink driving” or you wish to exercise your legal right to challenge the allegation against you and you wish to enter a Not Guilty Plea. This fixed fee includes your representation at court by one of our Solicitors or Barristers at up to three hearings (this should be sufficient to conclude the case) including representation at your trial – £4500 to £6000 (plus VAT)
• Not Guilty Plea and Trial for Failing to Provide an Evidential Specimen (with representation at court) – this will apply if you have been charged with failing to provide an evidential specimen and you wish to enter a Not Guilty Plea and challenge the prosecution case against you (this might be because you had a “reasonable excuse” or you wish to challenge the evidential procedure. This fixed fee includes your representation at court by one of our Solicitors or Barristers at up to three hearings (this should be sufficient to conclude the case) – £4500 to £6000 (plus VAT).

What Our Fixed Fees Include:

These fixed fees include all advice and preparation of our cases as appropriate, with no additional charges for specific items of preparation (e.g. the taking of witness statements, drafting legal applications and defence statements or the preparation of supporting documents). Unless specified our fixed fees for court representation include all of the above and our attendance at one court hearing which should be sufficient in all cases to which these fees apply. In any case where for unexpected reasons an additional hearing is needed we would limit any additional charge to £600.00 (plus VAT) to cover the cost of the additional hearing.

Our fixed fees also include all disbursements, meaning that we don’t charge you for things like travel expenses and printing. The only time a disbursement would be charged would be if your case required an Expert Report (this is when the expert charges us for their report and we – if your case is one which might require or might be assisted by an expert report we will tell you before you instruct us and we will never incur an expense on your behalf without seeking you consent. The cost of expert reports can usually range between £400 and £2500 (plus VAT).

People Responsible for your Work:

All work at Caddick Davies Solicitors is overseen by our Senior Partner, Neil Davies, who is assisted by Our Team of experienced Motoring Law (Road Traffic) Solicitors. We value our good reputation with both Our Clients and within the legal profession and it is expected that you will receive exceptional advice and representation and also an exemplary level of Client Care.

All of our solicitors have significant experience in motoring (road traffic) law and are regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority. You can search for them here – https://www.sra.org.uk/consumers/solicitor-check/

Our Team of Paralegals work under the broader supervision of Our Solicitors and are specifically supervised by Senior Solicitor and Head of our Paralegal Department, Mrs Sarah Randles. Sarah has been a qualified solicitor for over 26 years and has extensive experience in Motoring (Road Traffic) Law.

All of our Paralegals hold a degree in law (or equivalent) and many are further developing their careers either in undertaking further legal qualifications to become regulated solicitors. Irrespective of their stage of qualification all our paralegals are trained to carry out the specialised Motoring (Road Traffic) Law representation that we provide. You will find many of our Paralegals referred to by Our Clients in our reviews on TrustPilot – https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/motordefencelawyers.co.uk

You can find a full list of our staff by following this link – https://www.motordefencelawyers.co.uk/our-people/

If at any stage of your case you are unhappy with your case or have broader questions about the conduct of your case you are welcome to contact our Senior Partner, Neil Davies directly – neildavies@caddickdavies.co.uk

Legal Aid:

At Caddick Davies Solicitors we do not undertake work on a legal aid basis as this allows us to provide the best possible level of representation and to secure the best outcomes for our clients.

For the majority of motoring offences, save for the most serious offences where a person is at risk of a custodial sentence legal aid is not available and is also subject to a persons financial eligibility. Therefore in the majority of cases a person wishing to have legal representation for their motoring case will have to fund their representation privately.

If you wish to find a legal aid solicitor to see if they may help you please visit The Law Society for further guidance –

https://www.lawsociety.org.uk/public/for-public-visitors/using-a-solicitor/help-with-paying-legal-costs

Recovering your costs:

When we successfully defend your case before the court we will seek to recover your costs by way of a defendant cost order. A defendant cost order should be awarded unless there are clear reasons for not doing so (please note that Corporate Entities are not eligible to recover costs in this way). Once the court has made a defendant costs order, your file will then need to be submitted to the National Taxation Team who will decide what proportion of your costs will be refunded to you. If you instruct us to do so we will prepare and submit this application on your behalf or you we can provide you with a copy of your file. We charge an additional cost of £150 (plus VAT) for this work and with your consent would deduct this from any award.

Please note that whilst summary only motoring offences are most often not covered by legal aid, Defendant Costs remain assessed in accordance with Legal Aid Rates which are very limited. What this means in reality is that you will usually recover between 30% and 40% of the legal costs that you have paid, although you will usually recover the full cost of any Expert Report charged as a disbursement. Whilst this is clearly not very fair, it is sadly the law and we will always do our best to recover as much as we can on your behalf.

We advise that if your decision to use Specialist Motoring Defence Legal Representation, is based on being acquitted and recovering the costs of your representation that you do not use specialist representation.

Time to Pay:

We appreciate that the cost of legal representation is not always affordable, but believe that everyone should have access to high quality legal representation and justice. If you have difficulties paying our fees in one instalment, please speak to us about staged payments.