"Late" Formal Offer Beat by 9% Triggers Double Costs

Reasons for judgment were released today by the BC Supreme Court, Vancouver Registry, finding a formal offer that was bested by 9% and was delivered a few days prior to trial was capable of triggering double costs.
In today’s case (Kostinuk v. Fellowes) the Plaintiff was involved in a personal injury prosecution and issued a formal offer to settle his claim, three days before trial, for $175,000.  After a 6 day trial judgement of $192,345 was obtained.
The Defendant argued, among other things, that no post offer double costs should be awarded as the offer was issued too late.  In rejecting this argument and awarding double costs Madam Justice Brown provided the following reasons:

[10]         Reasonableness is to be assessed by considering such factors as the timing of the offer, whether it had some relationship to the claim (as opposed to being simply a nuisance offer) and whether it could be easily evaluated and whether some rationale for the offer was provided (Hartshorne v. Hartshorne, 2011 BCCA 29 at para.27). Here, although the offer was delivered on the Friday before the commencement of trial, there was an adequate period of time within which to evaluate the offer. As the plaintiff submits, by that point in time all of the evidence was available to the party. They had exchanged earlier offers. Discoveries were complete, expert opinions available. The defence would have been well able to assess the offer in the time available to it. Moreover, the plaintiff had provided an explanation that followed the offer within a few hours. The offer was within the range of likely outcomes. In the circumstances, the defendant would be able to assess the reasonableness of the offer and make a decision on it.

[11]         The judgment was $192,354.05 (including gross wage loss) as such, the offer is just slightly below the amount awarded by the court.

[12]         I do not have information as to the arrangements between the plaintiff and his counsel. Accordingly, I cannot assess the relative positions of the parties and their ability to finance the trial.

[13]         The other factor which I consider appropriate in this particular case is that the defence was conducted by the insurer who was well able to assess the risks of proceeding to trial. The insurer did so knowing that it could be exposed to an award of double costs should Mr. Kostinuk succeed.

[14]         In my view, having considered all of the factors, it is appropriate that the defendant pay the plaintiff costs at Scale B for the steps taken up to and including the date the plaintiff served the formal offer to settle with double costs thereafter, excluding disbursements which will be at the normal rate.