Excel County Court Claim

Coupon-mad

Don't actually type ''kicked out of court...''. A defence is more formal than that.

Gitface

Hello All
Well I did everything I was supposed to do, in a timely manner etc., but today got a Judgement for Claimant (in default) notice from Northampton!  Errk.
I sent my defence printed, scanned and PDF'd to CCBCAQ@Justice.gov.uk one day before I was required to do so.
What do I do now?
I really don't want a CCJ. 

[Later: I checked my inbox, deleted mail, spam, etc. and no sign of any bounce from CCBCAQ@Justice.gov.uk or any reference to the claim number anywhere in my mail (apart from the one I have sent)]

Le_Kirk

Call Northampton CCBC and ask them what is going on.  Did you receive confirmation when you sent the e-mail.  Can you log on to MCOL to see what it says on there.

Gitface

Le_Kirk said:

Did you receive confirmation when you sent the e-mail.  Can you log on to MCOL to see what it says on there.

I have logged on, nothing new except it states the judgement made against me.    There was no confirmation of the email sent, and I did keep looking on the MCOL website to see when it was updated but if I had known things would move this quickly I would obviously have chased it.
I will give them a call now.  Thanks for your help.

DoaM

Recheck the email you sent your defence to ... did you make a typo in the address?

Gitface

DoaM said:

Recheck the email you sent your defence to ... did you make a typo in the address?

I have called them, they said they didn't receive the defence on that address, I spelt it out to them and they confirmed it was right but they said they had received nothing, and I didn't get any bounce from my email server saying it was un-deliverable or anything....
They also said that even if I had sent it on 03 February, it was 'out of time', as it should have been in on the 01 Feb, 
Earlier it was stated  "With a Claim Issue Date of 31st December, and having filed an Acknowledgement of Service in a timely manner, you have until 4pm on Monday 3rd February 2020 to file your Defence." ...  which I now know was wrong.
Now the courts are asking me to pay £250 up front to set the judgement aside where my defence will be read by a district judge.  
Arrghh!
Check your dates people...

Le_Kirk

They also said that even if I had sent it on 03 February, it was 'out of time', as it should have been in on the 01 Feb, 

BUT the 01 February was a Saturday, so it would normally mean Monday 03 February.  KeithP posted this for you and he gets his dates right.

KeithP

Gitface said:

They also said that even if I had sent it on 03 February, it was 'out of time', as it should have been in on the 01 Feb, 
Earlier it was stated  "With a Claim Issue Date of 31st December, and having filed an Acknowledgement of Service in a timely manner, you have until 4pm on Monday 3rd February 2020 to file your Defence." ...  which I now know was wrong. 

Check your dates people...

I take exception to those words I have emboldened. Perhaps a better phrase would be something like "which the CCBC have told me was wrong".

 I stand by the the information I posted in the first reply you received on this thread.
Where I wrote:

With a Claim Issue Date of 31st December, and having filed an Acknowledgment of Service in a timely manner, you have until 4pm on Monday 3rd February 2020 to file your Defence.

With a Claim Issue Date of 31st December, Date of Service is five days later - 5th January.

Having done the AoS, the Defence due date is 28 days from the Date of Service - 2nd February.

As 2nd February was a Sunday, one is allowed until 4pm on the next working day to file the Defence.


This is confirmed in the Money Claim Online (MCOL) - User Guide.

On page 14 of that document it says:

How long does the defendant have to respond to my claim?

The court will send out a claim pack to each defendant once the claim has been issued and allows 5 calendar days from the date of issue for the service of the claim. Therefore the 'date of service' is the 5th calendar day after issue.

The defendant has 14 calendar days from the 'date of service' to file a response. If the last day for filing the response falls on a day that the court is not open (i.e. a weekend or public holiday), the court will allow the next full working day for a response. The defendant can extend the time to respond to 28 calendar days by filing an acknowledgment of service (AOS).

Upon what date did you file an Acknowledgment of Service? Your MCOL claim history will give the definitive answer to that.
In fact, it might be a good idea if you can post the full MCOL claim history here.

Also, in my January post I wrote that after filing your Defence you should:

...check it [MCOL] after a few days to see if the Claim is marked "defence received". If not, chase the CCBC until it is.

But really that is all just a sideshow.


The real questions are:
1) - why didn't the CCBC receive you Defence?
2) - if the CCBC did receive your Defence, then why did you not get an automated receipt response like everyone else does?

nosferatu1001

PLease copy and paste the EXACT email address you used
You may want to direct the CCBC to their own damned website, which tells them that a weekend is not a valid deadline

Gitface

Hi KeithP
"I take exception to those words I have emboldened. Perhaps a better phrase would be something like "which the CCBC have told me was wrong"."
Oh my word, I perhaps didn't word that very well and it was certainly not a dig at anyone.  I am very very thankful for the help here, really I am and the last thing I would want to do is offend anybody at all.  Please Keith, accept my utmost sincere apologies.
I didn't get an automated response, but as I wasn't expecting one it didn't occur to me that I should have questioned the fact I hadn't received anything.  I did look on mcol a few days ago but also didn't expect things to happen very quickly either. My bad.
Here is the copy/paste of the email address I sent the defence to: ccbcaq@justice.gov.uk

Here is the history from mcol:

Claim History

Your acknowledgment of service was submitted on 18/01/2020

Your acknowledgment of service was received on 20/01/2020

A judgment was issued against you on 10/02/2020

I don't know what to do next.