Expert Witness

PwC boosts its forensic disputes practice as growth in expert witness market continues.

    posted on          2015-10-09 05:49:57, UK


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PwC, the London-headquartered international professional services provider, has hired Tim Allen as a partner in its forensic disputes practice.

Allen joins from Boston-headquartered consulting company Charles River Associates, having previously worked for PwC, before departing to set up his own boutique firm in 1994 to avoid client conflicts.

In a statement, PwC partner and forensics disputes team leader, John Fisher, described Allen as “one of the UK's leading experts” and praised his experience of “working with major global businesses to help establish facts, analyse issues and resolve challenging disputes”.

Fisher, who is due to speak at CDR’s Autumn Arbitration Symposium in London on 12 November, added that the hire reflects PwC’s “commitment to supporting clients and legal teams in a range of disputes situations both in the UK and overseas”.

PwC is one of the ‘Big Four’ international audit firms, alongside Deloitte, EY and KPMG, but like the latter firm, has been awarded an alternative business structure (ABS) licence by the Solicitors Regulation Authority, allowing both to expand their services and spread into the legal profession.

Last year EY launched a forensic accountancy and investigation practice to support private prosecutions for fraud and economic crime.

Within PwC, the forensic disputes team works with specialists from other departments, such as economics and valuation experts, to deal with litigation and arbitration work, including investment treaties.

As an expert witness, Allen advises companies on litigation and arbitration, including investment treaty claims.

As the civil disputes market has grown in recent years, so has the use of expert witnesses, both in litigation and arbitration, gathering and presenting evidence to clients about their dispute, or giving analysis to courts and arbitral panels themselves.

Services they are regularly called on to provide include assessing the economics, finance, valuation and accountancy relating to a claim. There is increasingly a strong desire within the profession, from specialist providers such as FTI Consulting, Cornerstone Research and Grant Thornton, to become even more involved with the conduct of disputes from an earlier stage in proceedings, with the argument that it provides better value for the client in the long run, as they can more accurately steer the conduct of the dispute and inform better decision-making.

The greater role of expert witnesses has also led to debate about the best use of their services. Fisher himself has argued that the practice of ‘hot tubbing’ – pairing opposing experts off against each other in a court or arbitral hearing, is counterproductive.