When must I seek reconsideration of appellate costs allocation?

Verify the appellate judgment’s docket entry under Rule 36(a). Opinion receipt and mandate issue are separate acts.

Read the established costs allocation and any law, party agreement or court direction under Rule 39(a).

Distinguish reconsidering allocation from filing a Rule 39(e) bill or objecting after bill service.

1. Verify appellate judgment entry under Rule 36(a).
2. Exclude that entry day.
3. Count fourteen calendar days.
4. Check the final-day holidays, inaccessibility and actual directions.

Exclude the verified triggering day and count every calendar day under FRAP 26(a)(1). The last day rolls forward if it is a Saturday, Sunday or legal holiday. An actual order controls any granted change.

FRAP 26(a)(6) includes the listed federal holidays, days declared holidays by the President or Congress, and for a period after an event, additional holidays declared by the state where the challenged district court or circuit clerk’s principal office is located. Check the applicable state, actual inaccessibility and orders. The national calendar does not infer those facts.

Fictitious example

A fictitious court-of-appeals judgment is entered on July 6, 2026. Exclude July 6. Fourteen calendar days ends on Monday, July 20. Assume no additional state holiday, inaccessibility or different order.

Fictitious dates. Assume no additional state holiday, inaccessibility or different court order.

Allocation scope

Rule 39(c) applies the allocation to both court-of-appeals costs and district-court costs under Rule 39(f).

Mandate and continuing jurisdiction

Rule 39(b) forbids delaying mandate issue while awaiting the motion and preserves jurisdiction to decide it afterward.

Actual extension

Review Rule 26(b) and any actual court grant. A pending request does not replace the filing period.

Federal party

Rule 39(d) permits allocation for or against the United States, its agency or officer only if authorized by law.

• This guide does not decide costs entitlement, infer a local copying rate, read orders or grant an extension.
• District-court taxation and attorney-fee claims require their own procedures.

• Verify appellate judgment entry and the costs allocation.
• File the allocation-reconsideration motion in the court of appeals.
• Check motion form, local requirements and separate service.
• Do not treat the pending motion as a mandate stay.
• For electronic filing in the court of appeals, FRAP 26(a)(4)(B) uses midnight in the time zone of the circuit clerk’s principal office. Paper filing ordinarily ends when that office is scheduled to close. For ordinary nonelectronic bill or motion filing, the circuit clerk must receive the paper. The brief/appendix dispatch exception is separate. Check FRAP 25, current local filing requirements, actual inaccessibility and separate service. Do not substitute the district court’s electronic time zone.