Another seemingly positive CC yesterday followed, therefore, by a bad start to today.

A few wrongly reported civil SPAN codes, we are advised, have lead to a Contract Rectification Notice. Confusingly (and alarmingly) these do not even result in any prejudice to the fund, in fact quite the opposite. Some are interpretive issues regarding the woefully inadequate "End Points" others regarding the "Matter Type" codes. Neither are they in significant numbers.

This is followed by notification from a Cat. 1 Crime firm that they have just become Cat 3. Has the firm got worse or has the auditing become more aggressive or incompetent?

I intend to get this post up before I answer the phone again!

I'm in between Cost Committee hearings with a skeleton staff due to illness so only a short post today. And not a happy one at that (although I suspect a reasonable result from yesterdays hearing).

It now seems as though it is not just the top 10% who will be getting PACE audits this Autumn. Faxes received yesterday indicate that two other merely "high %" firms will have a substantial number of files called for on-site examination in the next few weeks.

For further details - or information about the North East Top 10% League Table - get in touch.

In the 9 year existence of JRS today is the first time I've been subject to "Corporate Hospitality" (rather than the very common everyday generosity of clients). I'm off a few miles up the road to watch the Seve Cup (a golf match for those not in the know).

An exciting two days of Cost Committee hearings Monday and Tuesday next week might reduce posting here - hopefully there will be some good news to bring back shortly.

PS. Training tour places still available.

The Preferred Supplier Pilot was a success. A consultation on its wider implementation, which they anticipate will happen next year, is due this autumn.

Use this extra preparation time wisely.

I'm tidying up the slides for the forthcoming training tour with TMT and co-speaker Rodney Warren. It is proving difficult as there is so much going on - getting four topics into 2 hours is proving an exacting task. I'd say it's a pretty essential course for criminal practitioners, but then I would wouldn't I.

Details from Sandra at the office.

It probably will not feature in the great journeys of our time. Nonetheless rushing from an enforced overnight stop in Nottingham to Newcastle (with a break in the middle to change into business clothes and pick up the papers which should have been "prepared" yesterday) for a Cost Committee hearing is difficult for an aging consultant with a bad neck.

The hearing? Not a word in anger, the Committee are with us regarding enhancement on a CDS 6, properly applying the Broudie test, and we are out in less than 3 minutes. At least home is now only 50 minutes (sorry 60 minutes Mr Traffic Cop) away.

Is it time for cost penalties against the fund in these circumstances? They have nothing to risk when making woeful initial decisions of this type, which are only compounded by some other numptie trying to justify them on redetermination. And as for then so wrongly putting it to CC.

Oh come on lets be radical, not cost orders but a return to something Medieval - like the stocks! Not for the assessor, who was probably simply following orders to drive down claims for enhancement, but for the managers responsible.

One last question - would you take the tomatoes out of the tin?

This is very, very spooky indeed.

I wrote the "Jackanory" piece below due to a strong sense of deja vu and now look what’s happened.

We have often commented on our predictive skills but this is just a bit too scary.

Cross my palm with silver and I will read you Tarot cards!!

We have been grappling with the issue of post CCA general findings and financial extrapolation for a long time now. We suspected a breakthrough when a Cost Committee (CC) finally got interested and insisted on skeleton arguments from both parties. A decision in that case and a Contract Review Body hearing in another should follow shortly.

Somewhat surprisingly a recent result from a CC resolutely determined both that it had jurisdiction in such matters and, substantively, that there should be no general finding and cash extrapolation in the case in question. Less surprisingly the Regional Director used her contractual powers to self certify a Point of General Principle by way of appeal against the committees decision.

The firm in question have recently received correspondence from the LSC seeking to amend contractual payments, whilst the appeal is pending, so that their contract including a recoupment will reconcile by April next year. Do they know something about the appeal we don't?

Once upon a time in a far away place happy family lawyers angered their overlords in the LSC. "Your average costs are too high", they said, so we must punish you and reduce your matter starts accordingly. They called this retribution AMC-SMC.

But over time this did not work and the overlords remained dissatisfied with these greedy subjects.

"We cannot allow this to continue" they said, and so they decreed that from thenceforth a new regime called TFF would be enforced. However hard and however long these lawyers toiled for their masters they would always get one set fee. And they all lived unhappily ever after.

As time passed, and the treasury remained half full, the overlord's gaze fell upon criminal lawyers. Some of this grumpy and unpopular bunch also had average costs which were too high. And so the overlord’s sheriffs were sent around the land to deal with these miscreants. This retribution was to be called "the 10% club".

To be continued......

Today just a quick reminder that you can link to you firm’s website in the side bar simply by sending its details to us. In time we hope this may become a useful way of finding, and attracting, agents in far-flung places.

Send a short pen portrait too and we will put that up here.

More on the top 10% topic tomorrow as experiences gather pace.

Apologies if this is boring people but I spent most of Friday analysing criminal billing stats. in preparation for a meeting with the LSC and a client. I don't want to put too much detail up in such a public place – and believe me we can do detail!

These particular clients spend on average an extra 12 minutes at the police station than is the regional average. I think we can make a sustainable argument however that this saves the fund a minimum of £10,000 a year in the proceedings class. Personally I think the LSC should be coming out to thank them.

Will let you know how well this runs.

The phones continue to light up to calls from "top 10%" criminal firms. Having run the numbers a few times now I have a robust opinion of the value of this "performance indicator". What is crystal clear is that it is meaningless outside a consideration of the other factors at play in the provision of police station advice.

The case I have just finished has made this case quite strongly and so we are back to the Regional Office to ask for further comparative data. If you need a template letter yourself get in touch.

We are embarking on a major new training venture in conjunction with TMT Professional Training. The autumn tour involves joint sessions with Rodney Warren and myself. We will visit 8 venues across the UK in October ranging from our neck of the woods in Newcastle down to his on the south coast.

If you have not had a flyer about this contact us using the address on the left or give us a ring.

Theme of the month seems confirmed as "corporate targets". The phone lines have once again been busy with worried criminal practitioners caught in the crosshairs of this new process.

I will hazard a guess here (actually it's a little more than that) that someone in the higher echelons of Greys Inn Road has had a visit from above, and one not bringing tidings of comfort and joy.

We predict an autumn cost recovery frenzy.

Last week I got to meet, with clients, a four strong team from the LSC (both local and national). The subtext, as you've probably guessed, is dissatisfaction with the firm's statistically judged performance. There is of course implicit criticism of the firm's overall professionalism involved in this.

As the LSC depart they leave the weighty bundle of billing data on which their concerns are based. This however, it transpires, turns out to be the billing data of one of their major local competitors (who in return have received our clients sensitive financial data).

Any thoughts on an appropriate contract sanction would be gratefully received.