What is a disposal hearing? Need to respond today...

twiggy95

Hi everyone,

I'm facing an urgent and concerning issue regarding a County Court claim. Last year in July, I submitted my defence following the guidance provided here.

Today, I received correspondence, copied in by the claimant, indicating that my existing defence was struck out due to a failure to provide an amended defence. Crucially, I was completely unaware of any such requirement or correspondence. Had I received notification, I would have promptly filed an amended defence.

The relevant email was inadvertently delivered to my junk folder, which I only discovered today. Had I not found it, I would have missed the deadline to make an application.

I am now very confused and urgently seeking advice on how to proceed. Any help or guidance would be greatly appreciated.

Gr1pr

a good lesson in people regularly checking their spam folders as well as their inboxes, usually only authorised emails get through to inboxes, the rest end up in spam

however, I am surprised that the paperwork didnt arrive in the post, or yet if its in transit , but 2 months is a long time for mail.  Did you move address and not update your local nominated civil court   ?  Check the address details with your civil court,  check that your court order was correctly sent back in February 

i would think that you need to email an amended defence ASAP to your local civil court , today , along with some sort of stay

Johnersh

In my view this requires a single application which:

1. Seeks relief from sanction - the o/p missed a deadline which had an attached sanction (ie that the defence would be struck); and
2. Sets aside the order dated 10/04/25 regarding disposal.

There is a need to act promptly and as noted above, the amended defence needs to be ready.

The disposal hearing will be to determine damages and costs only - the defence is already struck out, having not addressed the previous order of 10/02/25. That is why the suggestion regarding an application has 2 elements.

The problem with this is that the application discussed here, is that it is expensive. The o/p is unlikely to recover the cost of this application unless he can provide good evidence of non-receipt. If I am correct in that, the cost might well outweigh the sums in dispute. That may not be a problem for some, but it is for many.

Careful consideration is needed re the next steps, but the o/p must act quickly.

Coupon-mad

I agree with the above.

The Claimant now has permission to attack you for FULL costs at a disposal hearing for your 'unreasonable conduct' (not filing an amended defence) so you MUST file an application to set aside that Order dated 10 April.

Date your application TODAY and get it emailed TODAY. Download firm N244 and tick 'with a hearing' (sorry to say that's a £313 fee).

Johnersh is a solicitor (and I'm not) and I agree with his suggestion (which is not legal advice, to avoid any doubt).

Coupon-mad

What happened to the Order of DJ Cohen dated February? Have you moved house and mussed recent post completely?

Why didn't you see DJ Cohen's Feb order?

Or was it not EXPLICITLY ordering you to file an amended defence? We've seen that before.

twiggy95

Thanks everyone for taking the time to respond – I really appreciate all the input and guidance.

To clarify, I simply didn’t receive a letter in February instructing me to file an amended defence. The first I'd heard about it was through the email I was CC'ed into by the claimants solicitors, and unfortunately, that ended up in my junk folder. I know I should’ve been more proactive in chasing things up when I noticed the long silence, but I honestly assumed there was just a backlog or delay in the system and didn’t think to call the court directly.

Looking back, that was definitely a mistake on my part and I’ve learned a valuable lesson here – not just about keeping an eye on spam folders, but also about being more proactive with court timelines and following up when things go quiet.

At this stage, I think I’ll have to just take it on the chin and accept the outcome, including the court costs. It’s an expensive lesson, but a lesson all the same. Hopefully, this post and thread will help others avoid the same situation in future.

Thanks again to everyone who replied.

Coupon-mad

twiggy95 said:

Thanks everyone for taking the time to respond – I really appreciate all the input and guidance.

To clarify, I simply didn’t receive a letter in February instructing me to file an amended defence. The first I'd heard about it was through the email I was CC'ed into by the claimants solicitors, and unfortunately, that ended up in my junk folder. I know I should’ve been more proactive in chasing things up when I noticed the long silence, but I honestly assumed there was just a backlog or delay in the system and didn’t think to call the court directly.

Looking back, that was definitely a mistake on my part and I’ve learned a valuable lesson here – not just about keeping an eye on spam folders, but also about being more proactive with court timelines and following up when things go quiet.

At this stage, I think I’ll have to just take it on the chin and accept the outcome, including the court costs. It’s an expensive lesson, but a lesson all the same. Hopefully, this post and thread will help others avoid the same situation in future.

Thanks again to everyone who replied.

I think that's a mistake... please do think about it. The date wasn't up today.

You can apply to vary or set aside that order within seven days of SERVICE (receipt).

Is it BW Legal?

Do you know what you are likely to be risking? They have a disposal hearing where they will ask not only for the full judgment and interest but the rep's three figure sum on top.

We can't be sure but at the disposal hearing (if you just let this happen) they'll be awarded hundreds. 

Johnersh

Isn't the inbox sort of irrelevant? The orders from the court should normally come by post to a correct residential address. Is it possible they've sent documents to the wrong address?

The o/p has not received *either* order, since the email (junk mail or not) is simply Cs correspondence with the Court.

Car1980

The Royal Mail delivers 7 billion letters a year and 14 million never arrive. That's 2%.

Even if 0.5% of court letters never arrive, that's a lot of inconvenience for a number of people.

Gr1pr

Personally,  I would be getting the decision reversed due to not receiving the court order in the post,  complaining to the court staff, checking the address details with them, checking that it was sent correctly and not dropped behind a filing cabinet,  lack of proper service due to the court order not being received etc

Vary or set aside the order  , that would be my focus , plus non receipt by post of the February court order

Shouting from the rooftops about it,  not crawl into an expensive black hole

Coupon-mad

Johnersh said:

Isn't the inbox sort of irrelevant? The orders from the court should normally come by post to a correct residential address. Is it possible they've sent documents to the wrong address?

The o/p has not received *either* order, since the email (junk mail or not) is simply Cs correspondence with the Court.

Good point.

To the OP: two court Orders never being delivered to you is not just coincidence. Were the court using an old address despite knowing your correct address (we hope)?

If yes, you could possibly do a N244 and tick WITHOUT A HEARING (£129 fee instead) and say the order you want is to set aside the April Order and for the court to send a fresh copy of the unseen February order to the right address and extend the time to file and serve an amended defence for a further 14 days from service.

Ring the court first thing Tuesday to see where both orders were posted to. They were not emailed. Your deadline to object did run from 10th April. You were never served with the Order by post.

Attach evidence of X address to a short Witness Statement (signed & dated under a statement of truth) and say you spoke to court staff and the February and April orders were sent to Y address and have never been seen by the Defendant, who had no idea about any order to supply an amended defence. The Defendant only learnt about all this from an email from the Claimant dated xx/xx/xx which went into junk emails and was spotted on xx/xx/xx.