§ 31.007.Parties Responsible for Accounting of Own Costs

A record-keeping rule and a list, and the first is the one that catches parties out.

Each party to a suit shall be responsible for accurately recording all costs and fees incurred during the course of a lawsuit, if the judgment is to provide for the adjudication of such costs.

The burden is on the party, not on the clerk. A party who wants costs adjudicated must have kept the record; the court will not assemble it.

The section then removes the burden where nothing turns on it. Where the judgment provides that costs are to be borne by the party by whom they were incurred, no party need present a record of court costs.

That is the sensible exception. Where each side pays its own, the amounts do not need proving.

Subsection (b) lists what a judge may include in any order or judgment, and the word before the list is "including" — so the list is illustrative.

Fees of the clerk and service fees due the county.

Fees of the court reporter for the original of stenographic transcripts necessarily obtained for use in the suit. Note the two limits: the original, and necessarily obtained — a copy for convenience is not a recoverable cost.

Masters, interpreters, and guardians ad litem appointed under the rules and statutes.

Such other costs and fees as may be permitted by these rules and state statutes, which points outward to whatever other authority allows.

The final item is what keeps the list from being a ceiling. Costs recoverable under another statute are recoverable, and this section does not confine them.