What is the test for determining a successful litigant’s costs?

The court’s role in assessing costs is not necessarily to reimburse a litigant for every dollar spent on legal fees. There is a component of reasonableness which must be considered when awarding costs. As J.A. Campbell J. stated in Benetau v. Young, [2010] ONSC 33 at para. 13: As in this case, it has become clear that judges are being called upon more frequently to act as gatekeepers to access and determine what is a reasonable level of costs and what, in hindsight, was a reasonable amount of time that should have been invested in a case. A line of case law has developed that establishes that responsibility, that: …the cost award should reflect more what the court views as a fair and reasonable amount that should be paid by the unsuccessful parties rather than any exact measure of the actual costs of the successful litigant [citation and emphasis omitted].