Letter before court claim signed for by a neighbour!

Mishomeister

Well the issue I am apparently having is that I have shot myself in the foot by sending it signed for as I have a receipt showing I have sent it and the signature with gid knows whom signing it with Nr 6. I guess it might not be a bad idea to email refepient in a week reminding them they have 7 days left as this could then be seen as an opportunity I gave them to tell me they didn't receive the original letter?

eskbanker

If you have an email address for the recipient then why not just email them a copy of the letter now, saying that there's a copy in the post too?

powerful_Rogue

Or just send another copy of the letter via first class post with a certificate of postage as suggested previously.

Jenni_D

As previously mentioned ... whilst it is preferred, a Letter Before Action is not required before a court claim is raised.

Stop over-thinking this.

Manxman_in_exile

Ectophile said:

Where the law requires (or allows) notices to be sent by post, then Section 7 of the Interpretation Act applies https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1978/30/section/7

If you can show that you posted the letter, then it's up to the other party to prove that they didn't receive it - which is almost impossible to do in most cases.

But it's not clear that there is any legal requirement to send a Letter Before Action to anybody.

Playing Devil's Advocate.... there would appear to be evidence that it actually was not delivered to the correct address

user1977

Manxman_in_exile said:

Ectophile said:

Where the law requires (or allows) notices to be sent by post, then Section 7 of the Interpretation Act applies https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1978/30/section/7

If you can show that you posted the letter, then it's up to the other party to prove that they didn't receive it - which is almost impossible to do in most cases.

But it's not clear that there is any legal requirement to send a Letter Before Action to anybody.

Playing Devil's Advocate.... there would appear to be evidence that it actually was not delivered to the correct address

I agree this seems like pretty good evidence to the contrary of the presumption that it was delivered to the correct address.

But I agree there’s no formal requirement for a letter before action, this is only a potential issue if the defendant argues it and there is no other evidence of attempts to make a claim - doesn’t need to be an explicit “last warning before I go to court”.

powerful_Rogue

Jenni_D said:

As previously mentioned ... whilst it is preferred, a Letter Before Action is not required before a court claim is raised.

Stop over-thinking this.

Although not legally required, it is a pre-action protocol.

A claim should not normally be made until the proposed reply date given in the letter before the claim has passed, unless the circumstances of the case require more immediate action to be taken. The claimant should send the letter before claim in good time so as to enable a response which can then be taken into account before the time limit for issuing the claim expires, unless there are good reasons why this is not possible.

https://www.justice.gov.uk/courts/procedure-rules/civil/protocol/prot_jrv

Robbo66

Mishomeister said:

So I have sent the letter to some one I want to sue via recorded delivery and the tracking shows that the letter was signed with a number 6. No further info on the tracking whatsoever! The recipient's address is at number 5!

It looks like that some damn neighbours took my letter which can affect my whole claim.

Any thioughts on this?

First off you should never send that type of letter signed for as the recipient can refuse to accept it or in your case was signed for by the neighbour. You only need to use 1st class postage but get a proof of postage, the court will accept this as posted and received.

Ectophile

Manxman_in_exile said:

Ectophile said:

Where the law requires (or allows) notices to be sent by post, then Section 7 of the Interpretation Act applies https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1978/30/section/7

If you can show that you posted the letter, then it's up to the other party to prove that they didn't receive it - which is almost impossible to do in most cases.

But it's not clear that there is any legal requirement to send a Letter Before Action to anybody.

Playing Devil's Advocate.... there would appear to be evidence that it actually was not delivered to the correct address

That's why you should send legal notices by first class post, paying over the counter at a Post Office and getting a receipt.  That way, you can assume it's been delivered 2 days later.

Undervalued

Mishomeister said:

Well the issue I am apparently having is that I have shot myself in the foot by sending it signed for as I have a receipt showing I have sent it and the signature with gid knows whom signing it with Nr 6. I guess it might not be a bad idea to email refepient in a week reminding them they have 7 days left as this could then be seen as an opportunity I gave them to tell me they didn't receive the original letter?

Possibly yes!

The Royal Mail do not guarantee delivery to a particular person, only to an address. More recently that has been extended to specified neighbours etc.

As others have said, for most civil legal purposes proof of posting (to the correct address) is all you need as the normal legal assumption, on the balance of probabilities, is that correctly addressed mail is delivered.