Court costs in Spain

The Court costs or legal costs are the Lawyer fees, Procurador (court representative) fees and the fees of any expert who participated in the Court case.

The legal costs are regulated by each Provincial Lawyers Association (Colegio de Abogados).

Who has to pay the legal costs?

The client is always required to pay the costs, regardless of who has been sentenced to pay the legal costs.

Nevertheless, if the Judge ordered that the other party had to pay your legal costs, these legal costs can be claimed to the other party through Court.

If I win, do I have to pay legal costs?

Usually, the party losing the case is sentenced to pay his/her legal costs and the legal costs of the winning party.

However, the Judge can order that each party has to pay for his/her legal costs if:

1. The winning party didn’t win completely. If the Judge decided in favour of the winning party only regarding some of the requests in the claim, and the Judgment was partially in your favour, the Judge might not sentence the losing party to pay for your legal costs.
2. The Judge finds that the matter of the claim doesn’t have enough precedent in favour of any of the parties and decides that the matter in dispute needs to be clarified.

Therefore, even if you win a case in Spain, you might have to pay for your legal costs.

Normally, the losing party has to pay for legal costs, but this is not automatic and depends on the Judge’s decision.

You can visit the  European e-Justice Portal to get more information