Attendance Notes for Legal Aid Billing: How Your Notes Support Your Claim

By Custody Note Editorial·15 February 2026·Updated 31 May 2026

Product editorial team — criminal defence workflow guidance for England and Wales. Content reviewed for general professional workflow accuracy; not legal advice.

Your attendance note and your LAA billing claim describe the same work. If they do not match, the claim is vulnerable. This guide shows exactly how each section of your attendance note feeds into your legal aid billing.

Section 9 — Time Recording & Fees. Where the attendance note becomes the LAA claim — captured live, not reconstructed.

For the complete guide to attendance notes, see Police Station Attendance Notes (UK Guide). For the broader LAA context, see LAA Attendance Notes Explained.

Section 1 — Case Reference & Arrival. The LAA-required identifiers (UFN, DSCC, instructing firm, 45-min test) start the claim trail.

The connection between notes and claims

Every LAA billing submission — whether fixed fee or escape fee — requires a file that supports the claimed work. The attendance note is the primary evidence. An assessor reviewing your claim will check:

Does the note describe the work claimed?
Do the times match the fee narrative?
Is the attendance type consistent with the fee code?
Are disbursements supported by the record?

If the attendance note is weak, the claim is weak — regardless of the work actually done.

Telephone advice (INVB) — its own structured form with its own fixed-fee billing trail.

Fixed fee claims

The standard police station fixed fee is £320 (INVC, as of December 2025). For fixed fee claims, the attendance note must demonstrate that the work was done and the correct fee code applies.

The attendance note supports the fixed fee claim by confirming:

The type of attendance (custody, voluntary, telephone)
That the practitioner attended (or advised by phone)
The nature of the work (disclosure, consultation, interview)
The outcome

For most fixed fee claims, a well-structured attendance note is sufficient. Problems arise when the note is so vague that the assessor cannot confirm even the basics.

Section 9 — Time Recording & Fees. Waiting time, multiple journeys and total attendance time form the escape-fee evidence.

Escape fee claims

This is where your attendance note becomes critical. To bill at hourly rates rather than the fixed fee, you must demonstrate that the time recorded exceeds three times the fixed fee value (currently £960 for a £320 fixed fee).

The time breakdown in your attendance note is the primary evidence. You need:

Travel time — with departure and arrival timestamps
Waiting time — between arrival and the start of work
Consultation time — with start and end times
Interview time — with start and end times
Post-interview time — wrap-up, second consultation, admin

A single “total: 4 hours” does not support an escape fee claim. The assessor needs to see each component separately.

Your attendance note should also include a brief complexity narrative — why the matter required more time than a standard attendance. For example: multiple suspects requiring separate consultations, complex fraud allegations requiring extended disclosure review, interpreter involvement extending each stage, or overnight detention with multiple reviews.

Section 2 — Journey to Station. Travel time captured here flows automatically into the Section 9 fee aggregation.

Travel claims

Travel time is claimable where the Standard Crime Contract allows. Your note must record:

Time you departed
Time you arrived at the station
Distance or route (where relevant for mileage claims)

If you attended multiple stations in one shift, the note for each attendance should show the journey context.

Section 9 — Time Recording & Fees. Dedicated Waiting Time start/end fields with Now buttons, plus a notes box for context.

Waiting time

Waiting at the station between arrival and the start of work is a common component of police station claims. Your note must record:

Time of arrival
Time of first consultation or first substantive work
Reason for waiting (client not available, officer not ready, custody suite processing other matters)

Unexplained gaps between arrival and first work will be questioned.

Firms You Work For — instructing-firm contact details support disbursement and post-attendance correspondence.

Disbursements

Interpreter fees, mileage, and other disbursements must be linked to a dated attendance and a specific matter. Your attendance note should record:

What the disbursement was (interpreter, mileage, etc.)
The amount (or approximate)
Which attendance it relates to

“Orphan” disbursements — receipts that cannot be matched to an attendance — are a common audit problem.

Open Matters — the line-item view the SaBC bulk upload needs, filterable by client, firm, station and date.

The SaBC system

Since February 2026, claims are submitted through the LAA's Submit a Bulk Claim system. Providers submit monthly by the 20th. The system calculates fees based on the fee codes and data you provide. Structured attendance notes make SaBC submissions faster and more accurate because the data (attendance type, times, disbursements) is already captured in a consistent format.

All Records — every billable matter is a record, every record is auditable, every audit links back to the attendance note.

Building billing into your attendance note workflow

The most efficient approach is to record billing data as part of the attendance note — not as a separate exercise afterward. That means:

Record times as they happen — travel, waiting, consultation, interview
Note the claim type — fixed fee or potential escape
Record disbursements at the time they occur
Export the complete record — note + billing data — in one action

From attendance to billing in one workflow.

Custody Note builds LAA billing fields, time recording, fee calculation, and QuickFile invoicing into the same record. No retyping. No reconciliation. 30-day free trial.

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