Introduction
The Damages Claims Portal (DCP) is a new online case management process operating in the County Court which now mandates that – as a minimum – ‘damages only’ claims pursued by law firms are issued digitally.
Roll out is occurring incrementally. The new process is made mandatory for Claimant law firms as from 4 April 2022.
The requirement to use the DCP becomes mandatory for Defendant law firms in June 2022, on a date yet to be confirmed. Until then, Defendant law firms can ‘elect’ to register with ‘My HMCTS’ and use the DCP or not.
What it means, in real terms, is that all Claimant law firms who pursue qualifying claims must have registered themselves with the ‘My HMCTS’ website by 4 April 2022 and must use that website in order to issue qualifying claims digitally.
From now on, Claimant law firms can expect, on occasion, for insurers to nominate Defendant law firms by providing an e-mail for service via the ‘My HMCTS’ website, and for the Defendant law firm to confirm that they are registered and are willing to accept service via the new process.
Resource Links
A link to the DCP page on the gov.uk website can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/hmcts-services-damages-claims
A link to the ‘My HMTCS’ page on the gov.uk website can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/myhmcts-online-case-management-for-legal-professionals
Source
Authority for the scheme comes from ‘Practice Direction 51ZB – The Damages Claims Pilot’ which was amended on 4 April 2022. That Practice Direction refers to the project as a ‘pilot’ that has been running since May 2021 – which is true – but be assured, it is not a pilot from 4 April 2022, it is compulsory for Claimant law firms.
Authority
Paragraph 1.4 of the Practice Direction states:
‘The Civil Procedure Rules (“CPR”) will apply to Damages Claims save that where provisions in this Practice Direction conflict with other provisions in the CPR or other practice directions (“PD”), this Practice Direction takes precedence until the claim is transferred out of the DCP.
This Practice Direction therefore sets new rules relating to the issue and, where a Defendant is registered and elects to use the service, service of a qualifying claim – so it is essential that Claimant
law firms register with ‘My HMCTS’ and then comply.
Scope
The new online process currently only allows for issue and – where relevant – service of proceedings, acknowledgement, extension for defence and the filing and service of a defence and directions questionnaires.
The scheme will ultimately be expanded to provide a full end to end service for dealing with ‘damages only’ claims.
Exclusions
The new online process applies to all County Court claims for damages only (i.e. not injunctions etc) pursued by legal representatives but excluding claims issued:
• against multiple parties
(The process is designed to deal with one claimant versus one defendant, one claimant versus two defendants or two claimants versus one defendant)
• under Part 8
• via the Online Injury Claims (OIC) process
• under the Consumer Credit Act 1974, as specified in CPR PD 7B paragraph 3.1
• by/against protected parties or children;
• against the Crown;
• against defendants who live outside England and Wales
• by Claimants who have in force against them—
o a civil proceedings order;
o an all-proceedings order; or
o a civil restraint order.
Purpose
The new on-line process allows all procedural steps up to directions questionnaires to be undertaken:
• 24/7
• Immediately, on a self-serve basis
• In a paper-less manner
• with no human contact with the Court service
There can also be no dispute regarding the point at which procedural steps have been taken.
Extent of the service
A claim will be transferred out of the new online process and be managed as if it had been issued under the existing provisions of CPR 7 once the process has become exhausted. That may be:
• simply after issue, where the Defendant legal representative has not registered with ‘My HMCTS’ and elected to be served via the new process
• at some later point where the Defendant is participating, such as once a Defence and a Directions Questions is uploaded
Key features
Users of the services should familiarize themselves with all of its features, via the resource links detailed above, but a few points to note are:
• Where service has occurred via the process, notification to the parties will be by e-mail from the service
• Documents like the Claim Form, AoS and Directions Questionnaire are completely incorporated into the system and separate documents are not needed
• Extensions for the defence can be notified via the process
• Defences will need to be generated outside the process and uploaded
• There is no need to serve documents separately after they have been uploaded to the process
• The Court will not automatically enter judgement in respect of late defences; the Claimant must apply
• The Defendant’s Directions Questionnaire must be filed at the same time as the Defence. The Claimant’s follows.
• Applications must be filed with the CCMCC and will generally lead to the claim dropping out of the process
• Other documents, apart from the defence, can be uploaded to the process
Action Needed
As from 4 April 2022 Claimant law firms who pursue damages only claims which qualify for this service must not seek to issue a claim in any other way or they risk failing to issue effectively.
It is of paramount important that Claimant law firms in particular act now.
Defendant law firms not yet registered with ‘My HMCTS’ should consider registering themselves with ‘My HMCTS’ now in order to get used to the process before it becomes mandatory.