First One Is Authorized And Second One Was “Reasonably Necessary.”
In Balian v. Reliance Environmental Consulting, Inc., Case No. B255730 (2d Dist., Div. 1 July 31, 2015) (unpublished), defendant prevailing party was awarded costs for travel to certain depositions and for Case Home Page expenses (the latter which are electronic document service provider expenses). Losing plaintiff challenged the lower court’s denial of his motion to tax these cost items.
He did not succeed on appeal.
Defendant argued that plaintiff’s appeal should be dismissed because it was filed before the costs order. However, because a notice of appeal subsumes any later order fixing costs or fees where the judgment awards costs/fees and where it provides for later determination, the appeal was timely. (Grant v. List & Lathrop, 2 Cal.App.4th 993, 998 (1992).)
On the merits, deposition travel costs are expressly authorized under CCP § 1033.5(a)(3). With respect to the Case Home page expenses, the recovery for an electronic document service provider is neither expressly permitted nor expressly prohibited by section 1033.5, with the lower court determining it was a “reasonably necessary” expenditure given that the lower court expressly authorized the parties to utilize such a service provider as far filing documents.