In our most recent case success, a claim worth more than £80,000 was struck out for abuse of process. We acted on behalf of Dallbogg, the successful Defendant.
The Claimant issued proceedings for personal injury and credit hire on 21 March 2022, only one day before the expiry of limitation. An issue arose with the date on the Notice of Issue. While the Claimant’s solicitors attempted to sort this out, the time for service of the Claim Form expired.
Unfortunately, the Court then made a series of errors, initially erroneously entering judgment against the Defendant and then ordering the Defendant to file a Defence despite the fact that the Claim Form had never been served.
We made applications to set aside the orders and to strike out the Claim Form for abuse of process. Three days before the hearing of the Defendant’s applications (and nearly a year after the Claim Form should have been served) the Claimant made an application to extend the time for service of the Claim Form.
The judge dismissed the Claimant’s application and struck out the claim on the grounds of abuse of process. The judge referred to the judgment of Lord Justice Rix in the case of Aktas v Adepta [2010] EWCA Civ 1170 “A mere negligent failure to serve a claim form in time for the purposes of CPR rr 7.5 / 7.6 is not an abuse of process… for a matter to be an abuse of process, something more than a single negligent oversight in timely service is required: the various expressions which have been used are inordinate and inexcusable delay, intentional and contumelious default, or at least wholesale disregard of the rules.”
We were awarded our costs of the proceedings on the indemnity basis.
Alex Ivory of 2 Temple Gardens represented Dallbogg, instructed by Belinda Normandale.
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