Divorce - service of documents and deemed service

Sometimes it is necessary for us to personally serve the Respondent in issued Court proceedings with the Court
papers.

This could be because they may have either ignored the original papers that the Court sent to them, or it could be that they have to attend a Court hearing and the Court must be satisfied that they have received the papers.

There are in fact a couple of different ways of effecting personal service of Court documents upon the Respondent:

1. We can instruct the Court Bailiff to serve the papers. There is a Court fee to pay (currently £105). However, the Court Bailiff is very busy and, from our past experience, we know that it can sometimes take months for the Court Bailiff to actually attend at the Respondent's home or place of work and personally serve them.

OR

2. A private process server can be instructed to personally serve the papers upon the Respondent. However, this can cost anywhere between £75 and £150, or more, as it depends on how many visits the process server has to make to either the Respondent's home or place of work. Please note that this charge is not covered under Legal Help.

Affidavit of Service
This is a sworn document which confirms to the Court that the Respondent has been served with the necessary documents.

Exhibit
This is a sworn document which is annexed to the Affidavit and has a copy of all of the documents served upon the Respondent attached to it.

Deemed Service
In some circumstances, it may be possible to prove to the Court that the respondent has received the papers, i.e., an admission from them of receipt. It will be necessary to make an application to the Court for an order for deemed service.

We can discuss all of these options with you in further detail, should it be necessary.

If you have any questions or need any further advice, please do not hesitate to contact us and we will do our best to accommodate you.