(a) Interest of AED 86,912 on the principal sum up until 4 February 2026; and

(b) AED 90 per day as interest on the principal sum from 4 February 2026 until payment.

(a) Corrections to the Judgment; and

(b) The appropriate final order as to costs and interest following the Judgment and consideration of the parties’ submissions.

(a) By paragraph 1 of the order, Judgment was entered in the sum of AED 725,047 in favour of the Claimant taking into account sums due on the Claim and Counterclaim;

(b) By paragraph 2 of the order, it was held that the Claimant was entitled to interest at a rate of 1% over base which the parties were required to agree or provide submissions upon by 9 February 2026; and

(c) By paragraph 3 of the order, the parties were required to seek to agree a consequential order as to costs and in default of agreement to provide submissions on by no later than 16 February 2026.

(a) Provided for payment of the principal sum; and

(b) Required the Claimant to make a payment on account of AED 550,000 being 50% of the costs claimed within 7 days of the date of the Order.

(a) Whether Kitopi:

(b) What is the proper order as to costs and, in particular:

(a) Was headed “Re: Part 36 (sic) Offer to settle…”

(b) Started “This Offer is intended to be a Part 36 (sic) Offer, and is being made on behalf of Kitopi in relation to the outstanding debt of AED 517,550 owed by Mons to Kitopi…”;

(c) Offered to settle the matter for AED 258,775;

(d) Stated that the offer took into account any “counterclaims brough by Mons to date”;

(e) Stated that the offer would remain open for a period of 21 days from the date of the offer; and

(f) Ended “This Offer is made strictly without prejudice save as to costs and is intended to have the consequences set out in Part 36 of the CPR”.

(a) Was headed “Rejection of Part 36 Offer”;

(b) Started “This letter is sent in response to the Part 36 Offer sent on 13/09/2024..”;

(c) Had its second paragraph:

(d) Contained a third paragraph stating that the offer was unacceptable, that Mons’ counterclaim was of much greater value and the offer was rejected “for this reason alone”;

(e) Contended that the Claimant had been unhelpful and asserted that Mons “finds itself obliged to continue with its claim against you”.

(a) Mons understood the basis upon which the offer was made and itself referred to Part 32;

(b) That the offer was rejected on the basis that Mons’ counterclaim was of much greater value and was rejected “for this reason alone”;

(c) That the only respect in which the offer did not comply was the mistake reference to Part 36 rather than Part 32;

(d) That two English cases which contained a strict interpretation of the requirement that an offer must state on its face that it was intended to have the consequences of Part 36 could and should be distinguished; and

(e) That the court should apply the following principles of construction in the context of other English cases

(a) It did not comply with the mandatory provisions of RDC 32.4 including in particular that it “does not state on its face that it is intended to have the consequences of Part 32”;

(b) Reliance is placed on the English Court of Appeal decision in Gibbon v Manchester City Council [2010] EWCA Civ 326 and in particular the statement that the Court cannot treat an offer which is a “near miss” with compliance with the mandatory statutory scheme for Part 36 offers; and

(c) That it did not state what proceedings it related to given that SCT proceedings (by which the dispute was initially started) had been dismissed and CFI proceedings had not been commenced.

(a) Read as a whole, the letter purports to be making an offer not pursuant to Rule 32 of the RDC Rules but rather pursuant to Rule 36 of the English CPR Rules;

(b) That it is clear from the heading of the letter, the reference to Part 36 (on two more occasions in the body of the letter) and the reference to CPR rather than RDC;

(c) The letter was not understood or treated by Mons as being an offer made pursuant to Part 32 of the RDC – to the contrary it was treated as an invalid offer made pursuant to Part 36 of the CPR;

(d) It appears at least possible that Kitopi had misunderstood the legal position given the law governing the relevant agreement in that it had concluded that English law governed not merely the substantive dispute but the procedural law when it did not. Certainly this means that the letter cannot be read as simply containing “typos” such that the letter was intended to be and would be understood as being made pursuant to Part 32 of the RDC;

(e) Kitopi did not, as it could easily have done, re-issue the letter as a valid offer under Part 32 of the RDC;

(f) Although I accept that, as a matter of generality, the Court will seek to construe offers as valid Part 32 offers if it can properly do so, this does not mean that it can or should construe as a Part 32 offer a document which, read and construed properly, is not a Part 32 offer; and

(g) There are important statutory consequences of an offer being a valid Part 32 offer – in particular in relation to the award of additional interest which would not otherwise be due. Those consequences only apply where there is a valid Part 32 offer.

(a) Have rejected the argument that it was not clear to what proceedings it related – not least given that Part 32 offers can be made pre-action;

(b) Have found that Kitopi obtained a result substantially better than its offer at trial; and

(c) Have made an award of additional interest on the principal and costs at a rate of 5% above Base. I would have considered this to be an appropriate rate in all the circumstances of the case.

(a) DIFC Court fees AED 64,661;

(b) Counsel Fees AED 471,501;

(c) Expert fees AED 391,973;

(d) In house lawyers fees of AED 205,105;

(e) Transcripts AED 9,107.

(a) I consider that I have before me the appropriate material to make a fair determination of the costs sought. I thus reject Mons’ submission that I have insufficient material upon which to make a fair determination;

(b) The procedure under RDC 40 will, inevitably, have the consequence of further delay and expense in relation to the resolution of this dispute;

(c) The overall sums sought by Kitopi by way of costs are relatively modest compared to the amount of the Counterclaim which it has substantially defeated and the costs incurred by Mons (of over AED 3m);

(d) Although a detailed assessment would, no doubt, produce a more precise analysis of the costs payable, I do not consider that the difference between the figure produced after such a process and that after an immediate assessment is likely to be of a sufficient magnitude to justify the extra time and expense of conducting a detailed assessment.

(a) First, I consider that, given the outcome of the case, Mons should have accepted the offer of 13 September 2024. Although this was not a valid Part 32 offer, it was still an offer which could and should have been accepted.

(b) Secondly, I consider that the findings that I made in the Judgment as to Mr Elliott’s witness statement and his attitude to the dispute are such as to take this case out of the ordinary.

(a) There have been costs orders in favour of Mons or relating to costs in the course of proceedings such that the Court needs to ensure that costs are not being sought in respect of matters to which it has no entitlement;

(b) That account needs to be taken of previous orders in favour of Mons including, in particular, the costs in favour of Mons ordered by orders of 1 July 2025 which required Kitopi to pay the costs of preparing a letter of 6 May 2025 and preparing and filing an application dated 16 May 20 on an indemnity basis;

(c) There are historical matters which should be considered including:

(d) Effect should be given to findings in the judgment against Kitopi notwithstanding the overall result;

(e) That Kitopi should pay Mons costs of document production on an indemnity basis and that Kitopi should not recover any costs of the same;

(f) That Kitopi should not be entitled to recover any costs relating to bundling and trial preparation;

(g) That there should be reductions of:

(a) I consider that effect should be given to the Court’s order of 1 July 2025 in that costs orders were made in favour of Mons. It would be very undesirable for there to be a further assessment dealing with this matter. I have not been given details of the amounts claimed but I consider that there should be a deduction of AED 30,000 which is the maximum amount I consider would be reasonable for the items concerned. This is an assessment of Mons’ entitlement. I do not consider that there is any basis to suppose that Kitopi claims costs in respect of the orders;

(b) I do not consider that there is any basis to suppose that costs have been claimed in relation to the SCT proceedings other than a small sum in respect of Mr Doherty’s fees which I assess at AED 5,000;

(c) I do not consider that there should be reductions in court fees other than AED 1,121,75 in respect of an unsuccessful document production order. Fees payable otherwise would have been incurred in any event;

(d) I do not consider that there should be general reductions on alleged grounds of unreasonableness given the offer of 13 September which was rejected. I do however consider that there should be a reduction of AED 100,000 in respect of in house costs on the grounds that the document production process was unsatisfactory;

(e) I reject the reduction in fees sought in respect of two counsel. Given that Kitopi was not generally using solicitors I consider the use of two counsel (with one being quite junior) was appropriate;

(f) I see no reason to disallow any expert fees which were rendered necessary by the counterclaim; and

(g) I do not consider there to be any basis for reduction of transcribers fees which were incurred and paid.