Hot on the heels of the last round of civil court fee increases, further increases are being introduced and an ongoing consultation proposes even more.

The last court fee increases, effective from 6 April 2015, saw issue fees set at 5% of the value of the claim (for claims above £10,000.00) with a maximum fee capped at £10,000.00. However under the new proposals that cap looks likely to double to £20,000.00. The good news is that that isn’t going to apply to personal injury or clinical negligence claims although the reason for that particular exemption is unclear.

The bad news is that general application fees are increasing again with an application by consent fee doubling from £50.00 to £100.00, and contested application fees increasing from £155.00 to £255.00.

In 2013, the MOJ threatened (but didn’t go through with) increasing divorce fees from £410.00 to £750.00 which makes the actual increase to £550.00 a little more palatable, although not so palatable is the plan to double fees for asylum and immigration cases.

These changes, and others, are apparently expected to generate £108m a year overall in additional revenue which sounds a lot until you consider that HMCTS currently costs £1bn a year more to run than it receives in income.