Hudgell Solicitors—Jeremy Smith

Specialist litigation firm Hudgell Solicitors has appointed costs expert Jeremy Smith as the head of its new costs division.

Joining the firm after 11 years at Irwin Mitchell, Jeremy will now be based in Hudgell’s Leeds office where he will oversee the development of its team of internal costs specialists.

Chief executive Amanda Stevens commented: ‘We have a clear strategy to ensure costs are a focus for all across our firm by encouraging an environment where our lawyers don’t leave this vital part of the job until the end of the claims process, but have it in focus from day one and throughout the cases they run. Jeremy will play a key role in leading the development of this expertise across the business and he has a proven record of team building in this area.

‘This is not something lawyers are taught in law school and through qualification so to have somebody with such expertise in house and accessible will be a huge benefit. Jeremy has a very clear head for detail and technical issues also and we are sure he will prove invaluable to us moving forward.’

Jeremy added: ‘This is a really exciting and rare opportunity for me to head up a new costs division at a growing and ambitious firm and I am delighted to have joined such a talented team of lawyers. The aim is to develop a very strong costs team here within the business to not only make efficiency savings in our processes but also by expanding the costs knowledge across the firm, giving us an in-house resource to advise lawyers as and when needed on the cases they are running.

‘Costs are a complicated part of litigation themselves, but by improving efficiencies as to how they are managed, making them robust so they always stand up to scrutiny, and by building relationships with those we recover costs from, we can make the process as efficient as possible and avoid delays and issues with regards to costs recovery.’