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Asked by HMCTS reason for postponement request?
Hello
I’ve been given an unexpectedly early hearing date (25 November) for a PIP case I’m repping which I can’t make (the appellant can but has mental health problems and won’t go without me).
I’ve asked for a postponement saying I can’t make the date and had an email back from HMCTS asking ‘Why?’.
Aside from the fact that it’s none of their business, I always thought HMCTS was pretty relaxed about postponement requests as long as they arrive in reasonable time.
Anyone else had this happen? And any suggestions of what my response should be? I’m feeling pretty annoyed and trying to avoid being sarcastic!
The only time I’ve had something like this has been when we’ve had multiple postponements before and they, understandably, get a bit irritated at the ongoing delay so pushed back and asked for more information why we needed the postponement. In that case an email with evidence of the client having booked a holiday before the latest hearing date was listed was accepted and the hearing postponed.
When I request postponements I do tend to give them a little bit to go on for instance: “...due to having pre-booked time off from work that cannot be re-arranged” or similar. But nothing beyond that. So far I’ve never had an issue (other than the one mentioned above).
Personally I’d reply back and explain that your unable to attend due to a pre-existing commitment, that due to the appellants mental health needs they can only participate fully in the proceedings if you’re present with them and therefore a postponement is required so that you’re able to attend and support the appellant to engage in the process fully. You could throw out a mention of Rule 2 and that in order for the overriding objective of dealing with a case fairly and justly to be met you need to support the appellant but that might be too sarcastic!
That’s really helpful ta!
Over the past (ahem) 36 years I have tended to find that if you simply submit a postponement request without detail and assume that the reason is self-evident then it will be refused. Nothing has changed in that respect. When I have been training staff around such areas I have tended to the view that if you’re writing a postponement request of less than 1 side then it’s rare that you will have given sufficient detail, depending on the facts of an individual case of course, and you will have often been the author of your own misfortune. I have never found HMCTS to be relaxed over postponements any more than regional judges are relaxed over adjournments i.e. not at all. You effectively have to address every possible get out clause available to them of which there are many. “Someone else in your service could do the case?” “Move your commitment?” and many many more.
Right now I would imagine they would be less relaxed than ever because they are short of clerks in the offices and short of outdoor clerks. Many are doubling up and being stretched to or beyond their capacity. Venues with which HMCTS previously had leases for a presence 5 days a week are reluctant to maintain those leases when the venues are in some cases being used maybe 1 day a week at most and when there is likely considerable pressure from other court jurisdictions to make space available in order to clear backlogs. Thus a request for a postponement is a major problem when it could further jeopardise a lease when taken cumulatively with other related issues; there’s no clerk to actually process said request in a timely manner and the opportunities which might previously have existed to slot other cases in at short notice are undermined by massive delays in DWP producing appeal papers and there being no clerks around to process other cases which might be slotted in and so on. Add in that we’re nowhere near face to face hearings returning to being the norm. A couple of postponements could wipe a list and find HMCTS having to pay fee paid members for work despite the list collapsing. I don’t know whether that’s unsustainable but it’s clearly unhelpful.
I would take what CHAC adviser has said and build on it. In my case I would almost always tell them exactly why my pre booked leave cannot be rearranged. The task is to kill assumptions. Precisely because I didn’t do this I have previously been double booked at a venue for hearings at the same time in 2 different rooms. HMCTS assumed that 1 of my clients could be repped by someone else within our service. I eventually needed to send someone in to explain on the day why that was not practical e.g. because “someone else” would be unable to attend given that they were meeting a fixed commitment to our advice line etc..
Detail is your friend here. Ladles of it.
Thanks Mike - this is really helpful. I hadn’t thought it through to this level of detail. Everything you say makes sense. I can understand if they were chary about doing a postponement in the immediate future but did assume that 3 weeks notice wouldn’t be a problem.
Appreciate you taking the time to respond in such depth. I shall do as you suggest and keep my fingers crossed!
It probably was true at one point to say that if you gave them sufficient notice i.e. more than 2 weeks, then it was likely that most clerks, faced with lots of cases which could easily be slotted in would allow even the most basic of requests. Sadly we don’t live in that world anymore because of course if you pull 1 case from a day of face to face hearings nowadays it may be the case that your replacement cases are all video or phone hearings. If the venue isn’t set up for that then all manner of issues follow.