THE HIGH Court has approved further fees for the joint administrators of Quinn Insurance and their firm, Grant Thornton, for the four months from October to the end of January next. The fees, likely to be at least €1.5 million, plus legal fees, will be paid from the assets of the company.
The administrators, Michael McAteer and Paul McCann, and Grant Thornton received €1.5 million in fees for July, August and September, and had applied to the court to be paid fees calculated on a similar basis for October, November, December 2010 and January 2011.
They also sought that fees for their lawyers, McCann Fitzgerald, for the four months to January 2011 should be calculated on a similar basis to fees already paid to the firm over the past months.
Fees of some €290,000 were sought by the solicitors for July, August and September last on the basis of rates ranging from €160 an hour for a trainee solicitor to €495 an hour for a senior partner.
The president of the High Court, Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns, last week directed the joint administrators, who were appointed last March, to provide affidavits to the court to explain why their fees had not decreased significantly at this stage of the administration as he believed there was less work involved now.
In court yesterday, Bernard Dunleavy, for the administrators, referred to affidavits by Mr McCann and from Jane Marshall, of McCann Fitzgerald, outlining the basis for the fees. While hours of work for the administrators had reduced in some months in some respects, it was anticipated, as the sale process for Quinn intensified, it would take up more time, counsel said.
Mr Dunleavy also said the solicitors had provided that they would apply a 5 per cent discount on fees charged once the fees reached a certain level and that discount had been applied.
Having read the affidavits and heard from counsel, Mr Justice Kearns said he would approve calculation of the fees as sought and also noted the fees had been subject to peer review. The judge said the court had to be “vigilant” in monitoring the level of fees and expenses on an ongoing basis, particularly as the case was being relied on as a precedent in relation to fees in other cases.
