Legal aid costs: an overview of Supreme Court case law

The Supreme Court has published a thematic review of case law regarding the costs of professional legal assistance in administrative proceedings for the period from January 2018 to May 2026.

It includes 26 decisions of the Administrative Court of Cassation — 25 rulings and one order entered into the Unified State Register of Court Decisions.

The material is organized into five thematic sections:

1. General Issues. This section contains decisions on the criteria for assessing costs; the limits of the court’s authority during such an assessment; the application of the adversarial principle; deadlines for filing claims for reimbursement; the proper procedure for filing a claim with the court; and the ineligibility for compensation of legal services provided by a person who is not an advocate.

2. Reasonableness and Proportionality of Costs. This section sets forth positions regarding the circumstances the court must examine when allocating costs; the reasonableness of the claimed amounts; the requirement for documentary evidence; the proportionality of costs to the value of the claim; the conditions for applying the principle of proportionality; evidence of the scope of services provided, work performed, and their cost; hourly billing; the impossibility of exempting a public authority from compensation; and the allocation of costs of a third party without independent claims who participates in the case on the side of the public authority.

3. Advocates’ fees and other cost components. The article examines fixed-fee arrangements; reimbursement of such fees in the absence of data on time spent and proof of actual payment; criteria for assessing «contingency fees»; methods of protection against the recovery of unreasonable costs.

4. Allocation of costs in cases where proceedings are terminated due to withdrawal of the claim or voluntary rectification of the violation by the government authority. This section compiles decisions regarding the general procedure for such allocation; the conditions under which the plaintiff’s actions are deemed unjustified for the purpose of recovering costs from the plaintiff; and compensation for costs in cases where proceedings are terminated due to the government authority’s independent rectification of the violation that served as the basis for the lawsuit.

5. Supplementary court decision on reimbursement of costs. The review systematizes the case law regarding the exceptional nature of resolving this issue after a decision on the merits has been rendered; the procedural forms for resolving it; the grounds and procedure for issuing a supplementary decision; its legal nature; and the possibility of appeal.

For each issue in the review, the circumstances of the case, the Supreme Court’s legal conclusion, the details of the judicial act, and a reference to the Unified State Register of Court Decisions are provided.

You can view the Review of the Supreme Court’s Judicial Practice Regarding Costs of Professional Legal Assistance in Administrative Proceedings via this link.