| This article is part of the series: Courts of England and Wales |
| Law of England and Wales |
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The County Court Business Centre (CCBC) is a centre of the County Court of England and Wales created to deal with claims by the use of various electronic media. Unlike other County Court centres the CCBC does not physically hear cases. If any case might require a hearing it is transferred to another centre.
The increasing ubiquity of computers and Internet access led to public discussion of allowing greater use of information technology to run court proceedings.
In January 1990 the Claim Production Centre (CPC) (originally called the Summons Production Centre) was created, with the power to issue and serve claims through information technology. This is currently enshrined within Rule 7.10 of the Civil Procedure Rules 1998 (CPR). This states that "…there shall be a Production Centre for the issue of claim forms and other related matters…" and that the relevant practice direction makes provision for its use and any modification or disapplication of the CPR.
All claims issued through the CPC were originally issued in the name of a county court in the same way as claims issued in the traditional manner. In March 1992 the CCBC was created to remove the burden of routine matters in simple CPC cases from the other county court. The current definition of such matters is contained in Practice Direction 7C.
Currently both the CPC and CCBC are located in Northampton.
Use of the CCBC is available only to members. Membership is free and is available to anyone who successfully demonstrates they can meet the IT requirements of the CCBC.
Continued use of the CCBC is subject to the Rules of Membership and Code of Conduct.
Cases can be issued through the CCBC in two different ways.
Money Claim Online (MCOL) was created in February 2002. It provides users who wish to issue a limited number of claims to commence and manage County Court proceedings using a website, and to pay court fees online using a credit card.
Instead of submitting an individual claim form along with an individual payment of the correct fee for each case, CCBC users submit a single file containing each of the claims they wish to issue on a particular day as a data record in a specified format. Fees for all of these cases can be paid in a lump sum.
Files are submitted electronically in XML format via a secure API gateway using a system known as Secure Data Transfer (SDT), developed under contract to Her Majesty's Courts and Tribunals Service in 2013 by a third party supplier.
Previously files could be submitted on floppy disk or magnetic tape. For this reason long-standing users of the CCBC may still refer to the data file as the "tape". In 2012 a secure email transfer system was implemented as an interim measure until the new SDT system was completed. Once this was done the secure email transfer option was removed.
CCBC users may poll the SDT API to request updates on the status of their cases. Depending on the nature of the original request some information (i.e. basic validation) may be available within a few minutes of data having been uploaded, whilst other information may not be available until the request has been fully processed by the Court Service internal systems - this can take 24 hours or longer.
As well as issuing claim forms, the CCBC also handles requests for judgments and warrants of execution in the same manner.
Claim forms issued by the CCBC are served upon the defendant(s) in the same manner as other courts. However, the response pack also includes a password to allow the defendant to file their response via a website.
Where the defendant contests some, or all, of the claim, the claimant is required (if they wish to continue) to request the case be transferred out of the CCBC.
Rule 7 allows for limits to be placed on the types of claim that may be issued via the CCBC.
These are currently:
In addition the CCBC cannot be used to issue claims under Part 8 of the CPR.
In legal terminology, a complaint is any formal legal document that sets out the facts and legal reasons that the filing party or parties believes are sufficient to support a claim against the party or parties against whom the claim is brought that entitles the plaintiff(s) to a remedy. For example, the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (FRCP) that govern civil litigation in United States courts provide that a civil action is commenced with the filing or service of a pleading called a complaint. Civil court rules in states that have incorporated the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure use the same term for the same pleading.
In law as practiced in countries that follow the English models, a pleading is a formal written statement of one party's claims or defenses in response to another party's complaint(s) in a civil action. The parties' pleadings in a case define the issues to be adjudicated in the action.
A lawsuit is a proceeding by one or more parties against one or more parties in a civil court of law. The archaic term "suit in law" is found in only a small number of laws still in effect today. The term "lawsuit" is used with respect to a civil action brought by a plaintiff who requests a legal remedy or equitable remedy from a court. The defendant is required to respond to the plaintiff's complaint or else risk default judgment. If the plaintiff is successful, judgment is entered in favor of the defendant. A variety of court orders may be issued in connection with or as part of the judgment to enforce a right, award damages or restitution, or impose a temporary or permanent injunction to prevent an act or compel an act. A declaratory judgment may be issued to prevent future legal disputes.
A summons is a legal document issued by a court or by an administrative agency of government for various purposes.
An affirmative defense to a civil lawsuit or criminal charge is a fact or set of facts other than those alleged by the plaintiff or prosecutor which, if proven by the defendant, defeats or mitigates the legal consequences of the defendant's otherwise unlawful conduct. In civil lawsuits, affirmative defenses include the statute of limitations, the statute of frauds, waiver, and other affirmative defenses such as, in the United States, those listed in Rule 8 (c) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. In criminal prosecutions, examples of affirmative defenses are self defense, insanity, entrapment and the statute of limitations.
In English civil litigation, costs are the lawyers' fees and disbursements of the parties.
In law, a summary judgment, also referred to as judgment as a matter of law or summary disposition, is a judgment entered by a court for one party and against another party summarily, i.e., without a full trial. Summary judgments may be issued on the merits of an entire case, or on discrete issues in that case. The formulation of the summary judgment standard is stated in somewhat different ways by courts in different jurisdictions. In the United States, the presiding judge generally must find there is "no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law." In England and Wales, the court rules for a party without a full trial when "the claim, defence or issue has no real prospect of success and there is no other compelling reason why the case or issue should be disposed of at a trial."
In United States law, a motion is a procedural device to bring a limited, contested issue before a court for decision. It is a request to the judge to make a decision about the case. Motions may be made at any point in administrative, criminal or civil proceedings, although that right is regulated by court rules which vary from place to place. The party requesting the motion is the moving party or movant. The party opposing the motion is the nonmoving party or nonmovant.
In the U.S. legal system, service of process is the procedure by which a party to a lawsuit gives an appropriate notice of initial legal action to another party, court, or administrative body in an effort to exercise jurisdiction over that person so as to force that person to respond to the proceeding before the court, body, or other tribunal.
Discovery, in the law of common law jurisdictions, is a phase of pretrial procedure in a lawsuit in which each party, through the law of civil procedure, can obtain evidence from other parties by means of methods of discovery such as interrogatories, requests for production of documents, requests for admissions and depositions. Discovery can be obtained from nonparties using subpoenas. When a discovery request is objected to, the requesting party may seek the assistance of the court by filing a motion to compel discovery. Conversely, a party or nonparty resisting discovery can seek the assistance of the court by filing a motion for a protective order.
The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure govern civil procedure in United States district courts. They are the companion to the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. Rules promulgated by the United States Supreme Court pursuant to the Rules Enabling Act become part of the FRCP unless, within seven months, the United States Congress acts to veto them. The Court's modifications to the rules are usually based upon recommendations from the Judicial Conference of the United States, the federal judiciary's internal policy-making body.
The Virginia General District Court (GDC) is the lowest level of the Virginia court system, and is the court that most Virginians have contact with. The jurisdiction of the GDC is generally limited to traffic cases and other misdemeanors, civil cases involving amounts of under $25,000. There are 32 GDC districts, each having at least one judge, and each having a clerk of the court and a courthouse with courtroom facilities.
The Civil Procedure Rules (CPR) were introduced in 1997 as per the Civil Procedure Act 1997 by the Civil Procedure Rule Committee and are the rules of civil procedure used by the Court of Appeal, High Court of Justice, and County Courts in civil cases in England and Wales. They apply to all cases commenced after 26 April 1999, and largely replace the Rules of the Supreme Court and the County Court Rules. The Civil Procedure Rules 1998 is the statutory instrument listing the rules.
Default judgment is a binding judgment in favor of either party based on some failure to take action by the other party. Most often, it is a judgment in favor of a plaintiff when the defendant has not responded to a summons or has failed to appear before a court of law. The failure to take action is the default. The default judgment is the relief requested in the party's original petition.
The Wisconsin circuit courts are the general trial courts in the state of Wisconsin. There are currently 69 circuits in the state, divided into 10 judicial administrative districts. Circuit court judges hear and decide both civil and criminal cases. Each of the 249 circuit court judges are elected and serve six-year terms.
The Virginia Circuit Courts are the state trial courts of general jurisdiction in the Commonwealth of Virginia. The Circuit Courts have jurisdiction to hear civil and criminal cases. For civil cases, the courts have authority to try cases with an amount in controversy of more than $4,500 and have exclusive original jurisdiction over claims for more than $25,000. In criminal matters, the Circuit Courts are the trial courts for all felony charges and for misdemeanors originally charged there. The Circuit Courts also have appellate jurisdiction for any case from the Virginia General District Courts claiming more than $50, which are tried de novo in the Circuit Courts.
Civil procedure in Brazil consists of the rules of civil procedure detailed in the Civil Procedure Code, which has been approved in March, 2015, and being in application since March, 2016, in substitution to the old code from 1973. As a civil law system, it is heavily influenced by Roman and German concepts of civil procedure. In Brazil, civil procedure regulates the hearings of conflicts based in various sectors of law, such as private law, social law, and public law.
English civil procedure shares much in common with the civil law systems of other common law countries.
Pleading in England and Wales is covered by the Civil Procedure Rules (CPR). These rules set a high priority on attempts to resolve all matters able to be resolved by the parties, prior to hearing.
Civil procedure in South Africa is the formal rules and standards that courts follow in that country when adjudicating civil suits. The legal realm is divided broadly into substantive and procedural law. Substantive law is that law which defines the contents of rights and obligations between legal subjects; procedural law regulates how those rights and obligations are enforced. These rules govern how a lawsuit or case may be commenced, and what kind of service of process is required, along with the types of pleadings or statements of case, motions or applications, and orders allowed in civil cases, the timing and manner of depositions and discovery or disclosure, the conduct of trials, the process for judgment, various available remedies, and how the courts and clerks are to function.