We are continuing our series on Civil Procedure Rules, highlighting some of the little known but common rules and hopefully explaining them in plain English.

The next rule we will be looking at is Rule 7.5 – Service of a Claim Form.

 

The rule says:

(1) Where the claim form is served within the jurisdiction, the claimant must complete the step required by the following table in relation to the particular method of service chosen, before 12.00 midnight on the calendar day four months after the date of issue of the claim form.

(2) Where the claim form is to be served out of the jurisdiction, the claim form must be served in accordance with Section IV of Part 6 within 6 months of the date of issue.

 

What does this mean?

We have briefly talked previously about ‘Service of a Claim Form’ in previous articles when discussing Rule 6.3, 6.4, 6.8 and 6.14. This rule 7.5 is covered under Part 7, which is entitled ‘How to Start Proceedings – The Claim Form.’ So, Part 6 and the rules under Part 6 dealt with ‘Service of the Claim Form,’ but when you start proceedings you normally start by sending the claim form and the appropriate number of copies to the court, and the normal rule is that the court would serve the claim form However, there may be times when the court does not serve the claim form and it is for the claimant to arrange service of the claim form instead.

Those instances could be where you want to start proceedings to stop a time limit from expiring, as in some cases you have 2 years to start a claim, (like accidents on boats) or in cases such as breach of contract you have 6 years to start a claim.

You can start the claim by filing the claim form and paying the appropriate fee to the court but that does not mean you have to go ahead and progress that claim, because you may want to try and settle the claim. By filing the claim form at court and paying the fee to issue the claim, you can stop the limitation clock.

So, what this rule does is it gives the claimant a set amount of time to actually serve the claim form on the defendant. For example, if you can’t settle the case you may want to then continue with the court claim as you brought. So, what you have to do is complete the steps in the table (below) to serve the claim form. It must be done by the date (and certainly by the time limit) stated in the rules. I.e, it must be done by midnight, 4 months after the date of issue, as if you do not serve the claim form by 4 months later, then the claim would be invalid.

And so, as we have discussed in previous rules, there are various ways to the serve the claim form, but the step actually required to do that is set out in this rule. So, if you are sending it by 1st class post – you must post it in a post-box before 12 midnight 4 months after the date of issue, or you could hand it in to the post office. If you are delivering it or personally serving it – you can in effect wait until 11.59pm to do that, because if you do that it would be deemed valid.

If you are serving the claim form or arranging for someone to serve it for you 9you could be asking the court to do it for you,) you must ensure that these steps are taken by 12 midnight 4 months after the date of issue.

 

 

You can find the full Civil Procedure Rules online (currently) at https://www.justice.gov.uk/courts/procedure-rules/civil/rules

Any questions or support with the above please email us at: philip@whitecollarlegalandadmin.com or phone 0151 230 8931.