The Practical Lawyer

Knowing how much money is available to a defendant can be a useful piece of information for a claimant when negotiating, but is the claimant entitled to information about the defendant’s insurance arrangements?

The CA decision in Carver [2008]is of great significance to all litigators. Under the old payment-in rules, if a claimant beat a defendant’s payment-in by £1 then the claimant got the costs (ie the payment-in was beaten).

If a company receiver sues a defendant and loses, can that defendant get a costs order against the receiver personally?

The fundamental attraction of an arbitration agreement is that it avoids court litigation. Accordingly, one of the bulwarks of the arbitration process is the ability to get an anti-suit injunction, preventing one of the parties from starting court proceedings. However, the Advocate General has now held that such anti-suit injunctions should not be granted.

Deciding which courts have jurisdiction in a cross-border trading dispute can be difficult. From 1 January 2009, new EU Regs (Rome II), come into force.

It is often thought that commercially sensitive and confidential documents are not discloseable and are therefore safe from production in court. A recent case shows that is not always so.

A claim form must now be served on the defendant’s solicitor if the defendant, or his solicitor, has given the business address of the solicitor (within the jurisdiction) in writing as the address for service.

Under the old rules it had been held that the words ‘last known address’ when serving an individual were plain and unqualified – thus, it did not matter that the defendant was no longer living there.

There are now new rules on fax and e-mail service of documents other than claim forms; transmission will be deemed to have taken place provided it is sent before 4.30pm on that business day (any later and it will have been sent on the next business day).

By new Rule 6.5(3) a claim form is served personally on: