Acknowledge of Service without a Particulars of Claim - CCMCC

[Ssssssssss]

So I've taken a look at form n225 but it seems to be geared towards claims not counterclaims. Is this the right form to use for a default judgement if the claimant hasn't replied to our counterclaim?

Should I tell the claimant I am filing this?

Are there any negative consequences of doing this at all?

[Ssssssssss]

When I say negative consequences in message above, I mean will the judge look badly on us in way?

Both they and us have said on directions questionnaire that we want to use small claims mediation for example. Will this therefore look bad on us if we apply for default judgement now?

[Ssssssssss]

I've also just been reading your notes on setting aside a ccj and it mentioned that if we brought a default judgement against the other side on a technicality, we might be sanctioned??? Is not providing a defence to counterclaim deemed a technicality?

[Amethyst]

Personally, I would write to the otherside thanking them for the DQ and asking them if they intend to respond the counterclaim, point them to the relevant CPR and giving them 7 or 14 days to do so before you would request default judgment on the counterclaim. Then if you request default judgment and they subsequently argue the case, you can show you were reasonable and gave them every opportunity.

It really isn't clear, particularly for LIPs, how to deal with counterclaims, and the documents the court sends out don't exactly try to give any clues that you are meant to defend with the DQ.


" I am in receipt of your Directions Questionnaire however I note that you have failed to file or serve any reply to the Defence nor respond to the Counterclaim issued against you with either a proposal for payment nor a reason why you dispute the Counterclaim. If you do not respond to the Counterclaim within the next 7/14 days ( by 4pm on xxxx December 2018 ) I will ask the court to enter Judgment against you in default.

I draw your attention to the following Civil Procedure Rules and the accompanying Practice Directions - Part 15 - Defence and Reply and Part 20 - Counterclaims.

Nicey nice bit about mediation opportunities etc "

[Ssssssssss]

Personally, I would write to the otherside thanking them for the DQ and asking them if they intend to respond the counterclaim, point them to the relevant CPR and giving them 7 or 14 days to do so before you would request default judgment on the counterclaim. Then if you request default judgment and they subsequently argue the case, you can show you were reasonable and gave them every opportunity.

It really isn't clear, particularly for LIPs, how to deal with counterclaims, and the documents the court sends out don't exactly try to give any clues that you are meant to defend with the DQ.


" I am in receipt of your Directions Questionnaire however I note that you have failed to file or serve any reply to the Defence nor respond to the Counterclaim issued against you with either a proposal for payment nor a reason why you dispute the Counterclaim. If you do not respond to the Counterclaim within the next 7/14 days ( by 4pm on xxxx December 2018 ) I will ask the court to enter Judgment against you in default.

I draw your attention to the following Civil Procedure Rules and the accompanying Practice Directions - Part 15 - Defence and Reply and Part 20 - Counterclaims.

Nicey nice bit about mediation opportunities etc "

Thanks Amethyst, That sounds like a very sensible way forward. We still haven't received anything so I'm just drafting a letter up as outlined by you. Its so hard navigating the system when the other side don't seem to allow any rules :-(

[Ssssssssss]

Hi all,

We have now received a defence to our counterclaim after sending the letter Amethyst suggested we do. I was wondering if anyone could take a look at it at all? I've attached it here along with his original particulars of claim, and our defence.

I had some specific questions also if anyone is willing to look. These are :-

1. Did we have to tell or the court we have taken legal advice ? Also, I'm not actually a lawyer but I did write the documents on my parents behalf. They signed them and were happy with their content. Did i have to declare that i did that ? The documents came from my parents not me and I only wrote them up and did all the research on the legal side of things.

2. He has lied about the tiles and asking us for approvals. Is this something we should tell the court ? Given its meant to be signed as truth ?

3. He has said that there was a letter dated 4th June ( kind of can't figure out if he is referring to the letter we sent him on the 5th June as he has misquoted dates before ). Should we ask him what letter he is referring to or leave it till court time ? Worried he has made up a letter maybe ?

4. He said he put his address on the 13th april document but he didn't. If he produces a different document with an address on it in court, what should we do ? He definitely didn't give us any document with his address on it. The document only had his name and bank details.

5. He has said he got a trade discount. Is it sufficient for us to say that it would show on the receipt if that were the case but he hasn't produced the receipt so we can't see ? Is he right that we have no right to see this information ?

6. Why should the people we contacted such as tile association contact him ? Is this something we should have told them to do ? We were only seeking advice from them. Same with Trading standards, they said they don't contact directly unless there is a criminal breach rather than civil one.

Any help or feedback greatly received.

[jaguarsuk]

1. No need to declare anything to the court about advice or assisting your parents.

2. You can bring this up in the Witness Statement.

3. He will have to produce a copy of this letter as an exhibit with his Witness Statement if he intends to rely upon it as evidence.

4. Submit the original document as an exhibit of your witness statement.

5. If he intends to rely upon the receipt then it'll be as per point 3.

6. That's just him trying to validate his position, again in the witness statement just rebuff this with the reasoning you have given in your question.

[Ssssssssss]

1. No need to declare anything to the court about advice or assisting your parents.

2. You can bring this up in the Witness Statement.

3. He will have to produce a copy of this letter as an exhibit with his Witness Statement if he intends to rely upon it as evidence.

4. Submit the original document as an exhibit of your witness statement.

5. If he intends to rely upon the receipt then it'll be as per point 3.

6. That's just him trying to validate his position, again in the witness statement just rebuff this with the reasoning you have given in your question.

Thanks so much for responding Jaguarsuk, really appreciate it. I'll make sure that I put those things into the witness statements. Since this post, we have been waiting almost 3 months for the small claims mediation teams to contact us and finally a few weeks ago I rang them to ask what was happening. Apparently they didn't know why they hadn't given us an appointment yet either !

Anyway, we now have a small claims mediation appointment set for next week. If you have any tips on how we should approach this appointment then please do let me know. Are there any things we should or should not say ? We don't want these builders back in our home and thats a definite as they have lied to us and on the court forms but we are willing to be flexible on the amount of compensation.

[jaguarsuk]

Thanks so much for responding Jaguarsuk, really appreciate it. I'll make sure that I put those things into the witness statements. Since this post, we have been waiting almost 3 months for the small claims mediation teams to contact us and finally a few weeks ago I rang them to ask what was happening. Apparently they didn't know why they hadn't given us an appointment yet either !

Anyway, we now have a small claims mediation appointment set for next week. If you have any tips on how we should approach this appointment then please do let me know. Are there any things we should or should not say ? We don't want these builders back in our home and thats a definite as they have lied to us and on the court forms but we are willing to be flexible on the amount of compensation.

The appointment is conducted with the mediator first calling the claimant and then separately calling you. You will never all be on the line together and in the first call you simply need to explain the issue, that you don't want them back to rectify the work as they have broken your trust in them and are willing to be movable on a settlement figure should they make an offer.

Your approach of flexibility to the settlement is already in the spirit intend in mediation, so you are already approaching things the right way.

Nothing said or disclosed will be given to the court other than a settlement agreement if one is reached. Equally anything discussed cannot be used in Witness Statements or any potential court hearing. This promotes honest open discussion to genuinely achieve settlement.

Good luck, as if you can agree it'll put this to bed for you and if not then you will simply continue to a hearing.

[Ssssssssss]

The appointment is conducted with the mediator first calling the claimant and then separately calling you. You will never all be on the line together and in the first call you simply need to explain the issue, that you don't want them back to rectify the work as they have broken your trust in them and are willing to be movable on a settlement figure should they make an offer.

Your approach of flexibility to the settlement is already in the spirit intend in mediation, so you are already approaching things the right way.

Nothing said or disclosed will be given to the court other than a settlement agreement if one is reached. Equally anything discussed cannot be used in Witness Statements or any potential court hearing. This promotes honest open discussion to genuinely achieve settlement.

Good luck, as if you can agree it'll put this to bed for you and if not then you will simply continue to a hearing.

Thanks so much Jaguarsuk, the appointment is tomorrow am and I really do hope an agreement can be reached. Thanks for your message, it's calmed my nerves quite a lot. Will post if anything comes of it or not.

thanks again

sonal

[Ssssssssss]

Ok so we had mediation. The other side said the same things they have said before and continued to lie. Kept saying we don't have an independent report but he knows the court will authorise one so it's a mute point really isn't it? Tried to imply that our builders quotes are worthless because they aren't independent although they are.

Also said any new builder will say they need to redo the bathroom because they want the money... So implying again the quotes are worthless. But every builder is saying they won't patch up the old builders work so surely if we can't get a quote for a patch up then we can only redo everything as the new builders want.!


We offered a starting position to go from asking for 7000 to 6000. He refused and came back with his offer which was that we pay him 500 instead of the 1800 he is asking for.

I thought this was quite a big jump down for him...

We said no so it's definitely going to hearing now.

So would really like any input on the things mentioned about and also advice on how to get my paperwork in order and prepare for hearing.


I can get very defensive face to face and so am most nervous about how to prepare my statement and approach to questioning the other side.

Also, he wants an expert and so do we. However we are really concerned that he may know the experts he is asking for... They are a proper body but he knows a lot of people in the area and keeps mentioning he wants them which is strange given the obvious poor work... Is there any way we can avoid this in favour of someone else like the tile association?

As always any help is greatly appreciated. I was so hoping it would be over today.

[jaguarsuk]

Ok so we had mediation. The other side said the same things they have said before and continued to lie. Kept saying we don't have an independent report but he knows the court will authorise one so it's a mute point really isn't it? Tried to imply that our builders quotes are worthless because they aren't independent although they are.

Also said any new builder will say they need to redo the bathroom because they want the money... So implying again the quotes are worthless. But every builder is saying they won't patch up the old builders work so surely if we can't get a quote for a patch up then we can only redo everything as the new builders want.!


We offered a starting position to go from asking for 7000 to 6000. He refused and came back with his offer which was that we pay him 500 instead of the 1800 he is asking for.

I thought this was quite a big jump down for him...

We said no so it's definitely going to hearing now.

So would really like any input on the things mentioned about and also advice on how to get my paperwork in order and prepare for hearing.


I can get very defensive face to face and so am most nervous about how to prepare my statement and approach to questioning the other side.

Also, he wants an expert and so do we. However we are really concerned that he may know the experts he is asking for... They are a proper body but he knows a lot of people in the area and keeps mentioning he wants them which is strange given the obvious poor work... Is there any way we can avoid this in favour of someone else like the tile association?

As always any help is greatly appreciated. I was so hoping it would be over today.

Before you go to a hearing of the claim there is likely to be a case management hearing, you'll both be asked to submit the names of 3 experts. You can raise your concern about the independence of his at the hearing and ask the judge to pick 2 of yours with 1 of his.

If you haven't already you need to start compiling a witness statement with your evidence.

In court you will not be addressing the claimant, you will speak to the judge to counter any points and you really need to do your best to remain calm. The judge is looking at your credibility as a witness and if you react or misbehave towards the other side that will be damaged.

Best thing to do when they make statements that are outrageous is to simply say to the judge that it is and why calmly. You can let your frustration out later with a judgement in hand.

[Ssssssssss]

Before you go to a hearing of the claim there is likely to be a case management hearing, you'll both be asked to submit the names of 3 experts. You can raise your concern about the independence of his at the hearing and ask the judge to pick 2 of yours with 1 of his.

If you haven't already you need to start compiling a witness statement with your evidence.

In court you will not be addressing the claimant, you will speak to the judge to counter any points and you really need to do your best to remain calm. The judge is looking at your credibility as a witness and if you react or misbehave towards the other side that will be damaged.

Best thing to do when they make statements that are outrageous is to simply say to the judge that it is and why calmly. You can let your frustration out later with a judgement in hand.

Thanks so much Jaguarsuk. Is there a reason i can give for asking the judge to pick two of our experts rather than 2 of his ? Or is this as a consequence of us telling the judge that his are not credible ?

Also, I guess I should get on with the witness statements like you have stated. At least if i start then it wont be a last minute panic. Just wondering, I have a tendency to be very very detailed about things. I'm trying to think about what the best technique is for compiling my witness statement without it becoming a 20 page essay. Should i say things like "various emails were sent over x time period stating xyz and causing delays by slow responses from the other side, refer to Exhibit X. " or should i be listing out the issues instead ?

Not sure how to approach it. Do you have an example statement maybe ? Or some help notes on this forum ?

Thanks again Jaguarsuk. I cant thank you enough for all your help and support.

[jaguarsuk]

It’s just a case of their credibility and why you would doubt it, add in that if they are truly confident of their position they won’t mind 2 of your 3 being used.

It’s only a possibility at the moment, you’ll need to see what the next order of the court is.

The Witness Statement is basically the story from beginning to end, but where you can group writhing together for ease of reading it’s preferable for ease of reading.

There’s a guid and template on this site.

[Ssssssssss]

It’s just a case of their credibility and why you would doubt it, add in that if they are truly confident of their position they won’t mind 2 of your 3 being used.

It’s only a possibility at the moment, you’ll need to see what the next order of the court is.

The Witness Statement is basically the story from beginning to end, but where you can group writhing together for ease of reading it’s preferable for ease of reading.

There’s a guid and template on this site.

Thanks Jaguarsuk. So we have just received finally an order asking for a preliminary hearing. All it says is to have it so as to "to identify the issues, the need for expert evidence and required directions". It literally says nothing else about anything or what to bring or submit or otherwise.

How can we prepare for that without any further information ? What should we take with us ? Should i prepare a summary list of issues to take and also take all our paperwork with us on the day too ? Should i go ahead and find / list what experts we want ?

Really don't know what to take and prepare as they've not said anything else at all !