Court of Appeal—the issue date of a claim form is the date on which it is sealed (Bali v 1-2 Couriers Ltd)
Dispute Resolution analysis: The Court of Appeal held that the issue date of the claim form is the date on which it is sealed, not the date on which the court sends it back to the claimant/claimant’s solicitors to effect service. This has practical relevance when determining the deadline for service as the four-month service period starts from the date of issue. In this case, the sealed claim form had not been received by the claimant’s solicitors, from the court, until after the service deadline had passed. The only option available to the claimant to seek to effect valid service was a retrospective extension of time; relief from sanctions not being available for late or invalid service. However, the court, agreeing with the judge at first instance, held that the solicitors had failed to comply with the requirement to have taken all reasonable steps to serve the claim form as required under CPR 7.6(3). When considering whether this requirement has been met, it was held that the court can have regard to the entire background history, not just the period after the time for service has expired.