Fancy A Divorce?Then Go Online And Click Away !

They have been trying out allowing some of you after a divorce to be able to start the process online and to pay the court fee online (see http://www.breakinglaw.co.uk/2017/09/divorce-on-line.html). They have been happy with the results of the trials and so, last week, the online facility was opened up to everyone in England and Wales. It will not yet be available to solicitors who are acting for divorce petitioners but only to petitioners doing it for themselves. Solicitors will be brought in soon but, for the time being, litigants in person are in a favoured position. In due course, the whole divorce process will be capable of management on line so long as the case is undefended.

The online case will be handled at one of four of the regional divorce centres based in Nottingham, Stoke (despite their relegation from the Premier League), Liverpool and Southampton and the court fee will be the same online as off line: that's £550 unless you successfully ask for the fee to be remitted because you are on benefits or otherwise down and out. You start off online by going to https://www.gov.uk/apply-for-divorce.

Todays' Sunday Times carried a muddled explanation of the divorce process. It won't be necessary for an account to be given of 'wealth and income' or 'arrangements for the children' as suggested in order to procure the divorce. Those subjects will come alive if and only if there is an application by one party for a financial remedy such as maintenance or there are proceedings under the Children Act 1989 about the welfare of the children. Financial applications might possibly lead to the final divorce decree - the decree absolute - being delayed but children issues will not do so. You can't start the divorce process until you have been married for at least one year. There have been some cases where divorce cases have been started before the first year was up and decrees have been obtained. These decrees are nullities as will be any remarriage which has taken place on the strength of them. Fresh proceedings will be needed to put the situation right.

Say your husband or wife want to defend the case? No change in the law there but on 17 May 2018 the Supreme Court is due to consider what conduct should be necessary to establish that you spouse has been guilty of unreasonable behaviour which is one of the divorce grounds. I've looked at the case with you in an earlier blog (see http://www.breakinglaw.co.uk/2017/08/will-wife-gain-freedom-from-marriage.html). You can watch the hearing online on the day but the Supreme Court's decision is likely to be  announced  subsequently after the judges have pondered their decision over their fish and chips and pickled onions.

Plenty on divorce and how to tackle financial remedy applications for both sides in my book Breaking Law.

There's A Poisonous Fly In My Soup: Second Course

The new regime for making a package travel claim and for restricting legal costs that can be recovered by a successful claimant which travel operators had been begging for comes into force on 7 May 2018 (seehttp://www.breakinglaw.co.uk/2018/04/theres-poisonous-fly-in-my-soup-update.html).

I had suggested that the pre-action protocol which should be followed could do with clarification as to whether or not it applied to small claims. The protocol has just been amended to give that clarification. The protocol will not apply to small claims. We are here talking about claims for compensation for personal injury and loss of amenities for up to £1,000.

Package Holidays: Don't Book Early

The law protecting holidaymakers in the Package Travel, Package Holiday and Package Tours Regulations 1992 (if you don't get the package you were promised the likelihood is that the travel company will be liable to you even though third parties may be at fault) is set to change for agreements made on or after 1 July 2018. It may benefit you to postpone your booking until then. The new law will follow a European directive issued in 2015 and will be contained in the Package Travel and Linked Travel Arrangements Regulations which have been published in draft form. The government's deadline for implementation of the directive is....1 July 2018.

A great deal of the current law will be repeated in the new law. But here are some of the valuable changes.

• More package holidays will be covered. Definitely 'in' will be holidays which these days are often purchased on line where separate contracts under the package are made with different travel service providers and you customise exactly what you want later on in a bespoke product. So-called 'linked travel arrangements' which are looser combinations of travel arrangements are also caught where a trader organises the making of separate contracts for travel services with different providers.
• More package organisers will be liable when the regulations are breached. For example, more so-called Flight-Plus holidays are likely to be covered. 
• There's a cap on any attempt to increase the price of the package by more than 8% after you have made your contract. Any increase, be it 8% or less, must be notified with justification for it at least 20 days before the holiday. Where the increase is over 8% you will be entitled to get out of the contract and without any charge for the privilege of doing so.
• Where getting you home is delayed because of unavoidable and extraordinary circumstances, the organiser must  provide you with free accommodation, if possible to an equivalent standard to that you should have enjoyed in the package, for up to three nights. The three nights limit will not apply if you have reduced mobility when flying or are accompanying someone with reduced mobility, are a pregnant woman or an unaccompanied minor or are in need of specific medical assistance, and this was notified to the organiser at least 48 hours before the holiday.

That Waitrose Car Park (Again)

Oh dear, another blip at Waitrose, Richmond-upon-Thames. Long-suffering visitors to this blog will be aware that things have a habit of going wrong there, especially when it comes to the car park (see http://www.breakinglaw.co.uk/2018/04/waitrose-loses-power-or-how-i-hate-self.html). So here we go again. 

From: STEPHEN GOLD 

Sent: 26/04/2018 18:47

To: customerserviceteam@waitrose.co.uk

Subject: Richmond Car Park

This is a copy of the car park ticket issued to me today at your Richmond-upon-Thames branch. I can offer you two bananas for the price of one and a free coffee so long as you bring your own cup if you can tell me the time of issue. Because I can’t. Given your miserable record on car park horological issues at the branch, can I suggest that you ensure tickets are printed with the time of issue in characters which can be deciphered without the assistance of the strongest pair of specs known to man and a specialist in the art of guesswork?

I am

Stephen Gold

Waitrose Customer Service 

To: STEPHEN GOLD 

Customer Case Ref 04769862  

I have informed the branch management team of your comments who will be able to contact the car parking company to ensure that the tickets are issued correctly with visible time and date information.

I do appreciate you taking the time to alert us to this problem.

Kind regards, 

Carole Harman 

Customer Care

Case Ref 04769862

Pay Slip Reform

As from 6 April 2019 (please note, that's next year!) pay slips will get sexier. For those whose pay varies according to the time worked, the pay slip will have particularise the total number of hours worked by way of a single aggregate figure or separate figures for different rates of pay. The idea is to assist you to identify underpayment, whether it be less than the minimum or living wage or the entitlement under your contract. And the obligation to provide a pay statement will be extended to all workers and not just employees.

If you don't believe me, go to the Employment Rights Act 1996 (Itemised Pay Statement) (Amendment) Order 2018 SI 2018/147 and the Employment Rights Act 1996 (Itemised Pay Statement) (Amendment) (No 2) Order 2018 SI 2018/529. But not in work time!!!

County Court Judgment: Latest on Getting Instalment Order

'Judge, I can only afford £1 a month.'
'This is no good to my clients, Judge. They have a court order and they want their money IN FULL and NOW!!!'

There's just been a major ruling from the Court of Appeal * on how county courts should approach a debtor's plea for time to pay. Normally, a county court judgment will be payable within a fortnight. You can ask the court to give you longer or to allow you to pay by instalments. This you can do when admitting the debt having received the court claim form. Or if there is a court hearing which ends with you being ordered to pay, you can ask the judge there and then to give you longer than a fortnight or to allow instalments, although the probability is that the judge will not have time to go into the detail of your finances at that stage and will leave you to seek more time or instalments by a written application. Or you can make that written application at any time after judgment, whether or not there has been a hearing.

How should the court approach your plea, whenever you may make it? In the recent case, the debtor was offering £50 per month towards an £8,000 debt which arose out of a disputed traffic penalty ticket! But she was on the verge of bankruptcy and the £50 would not even have settled the 8% interest due on the judgement.  A county court judgment generally attracts interest if it is for at least £5,000. In rejecting this debtor's instalment offer, the Court of Appeal said that when a debtor cannot really afford to pay anything  and the creditor wants to get the debt paid off  NOW!!! and to bring enforcement action to achieve this then the court should let the creditor do as they wish and not allow instalments.

This guidance will almost certainly be trotted out by your creditor or their lawyer when you make a plea for time. But the guidance did not stop there and so make sure the judge hears more of what the Court of Appeal said. The  circumstances did not have to be exceptional for instalments to be ordered and there could be instalments even when the debtor is insolvent (they owe more than they are worth). However, the debtor has to put forward a realistic payment schedule backed up by evidence that the creditor can be expected to receive their money and any interest on the judgment within a reasonable period of time. There might be a case for refusing time to pay where the creditor has their own cash-flow problems. Equally, there will be other cases where a limited period of time will enable the debt to be paid without significant prejudice to the creditor, particularly where interest on a £5,000 plus debt is payable.

So don't be put off by asking for instalments if you need to. And remind the court that  your creditor cannot now seek to bankrupt you unless you owe them at least £5000. Also, interest on the judgement would come to an end if the creditor put in the bailiff and that produced some payment.

There's much, much more on how to handle debt and court proceedings about debt in my book Breaking Law. But hopefully the bailiff won't seize it! 

* The case is Loson v Brett Stack and Newlyn PLC [2-18] EWCA Civ 803

The Prick Case. Titter Permitted

	(1) HENRY MARTINEZ T/A PRICK (2) HENRY HATE STUDIO & PRICK TATTOO PARLOUR LONDON LIMITED	Claimants
	- and -
	PRICK ME BABY ONE MORE TIME LIMITED T/A PRICK GYNELLE LEON	Defendants

Legal proceedings are not funny. They are serious matters for the courts and the parties and are not intended as entertainment for the general public or for anyone else. But very, very, very occasionally there may just be a tiny (if you will forgive me) feature about a case that will raise a titter from you and for which you may be forgiven so long as the titter is not emitted in court. May I suggest that one such case was The Prick Case * which was decided last week in London's Intellectual Property Court.

The case was what is known as a 'passing off' claim involving a tattoo business in Shoreditch which had been set up in 2001 under the trading name of Prick Tattoos (the late Amy Winehouse was a client) and a retail cactus and succulent plant business which had been set up in Dalston in 2016 under the trading name of Prick. The tattoo business owners alleged that the cactus business could be confused with the tattoo business. You may have thought that such an argument would be difficult to sustain and you would be right. The claim was dismissed. 

* [2018] EWHC 776 (IPEC)