Courts expect you to:

• follow all the court rules (known as the Civil Procedure Rules – see Civil Procedure Rules - CPR),
• provide enough information to allow the other side and the court to understand what the dispute is about and what you are asking for,
• do things within the relevant time limits or if no time limit is mentioned then within a reasonable period,
•  use alternative dispute resolution (for example, mediation) to try and resolve the claim without the need to go to court,
• minimise expense, especially when there is a need to get expert evidence,
• give the other side the documents they have asked for unless there is a good reason not to,
• tell the other side if you are a litigant in person, or if you have a conditional fee agreement (often called ‘no win, no fee’) or you have made arrangements for your legal costs to be paid by someone else, for example, an insurance company or trade union,
• send the defendant a copy of anything you send to the court, 
• attend court when ordered to do so (you may be able to request a telephone or video hearing),
• make all your allegations against the defendant at the same time or, if you do not do this, explain why you think you should not have to.

The civil procedure rules are the court rules that you have to follow when you sue someone. They explain what you need to do, and when. If you hear lawyers talk about the ‘CPR’ they are referring to these rules. You need to follow the ones that apply to your case. If you don’t follow the rules, it could cost you money, cause you to lose the right to rely on something you would like to rely on, or cause you to lose your case.

A quick look at the civil procedure rules will probably just confirm your worst fears - there are loads of them. And an individual rule often comes with one or more additional bits of guidance, called ‘practice directions’. The good news is that only some of the rules and practice directions are likely to apply to your case. So, it’s not like a book, you don’t have to start at the beginning and read all the way through to the end. You need to pick out the rules that are relevant to your case. This series of guides about how to sue someone will help you do this by listing and linking to those rules that are most relevant to each stage in the court procedure we describe.

Once you have decided to start a claim, and have got the bulk of your evidence together, you need to check if there is a pre-action protocol for your type of case.
A pre-action protocol describes the procedure the court expects you to follow before you formally start a case. It gives details about how to behave and what to do. There are specific pre-action protocols for many types of case. If your type of claim is not covered by a specific pre-action protocol you need to follow the practice direction on pre-action conduct (see below).

The court will expect you to follow the relevant pre-action protocol if you start proceedings after the date that it came into force.

Essentially, this is a ‘cards on the table’ approach. The aim is to encourage early and full information exchange so each side can:

• understand each other’s position,
• make decisions about how to proceed,
• try to agree a settlement without starting court proceedings,
• consider some form of Alternative Dispute Resolution (for example, civil mediation)
• support the efficient management of the claim, and
• reduce the cost of resolving the claim.

Currently there are pre-action protocols for claims about:

• debt (where the claimant is a business claiming money from an individual),
• package travel claims,
• personal injury (where the total claim is likely to be  allocated to the fast-track (for example, because it is worth under £25,000) and where other relevant pre-action protocol in relation to personal injury, disease and illness or clinical negligence does not apply),
• low value personal injury (employer’s liability and public liability) - this is where the total claim is worth under £25,000 but the personal injury element is worth over £1,500 if the case was started after 6th April 2022, 
• low value personal injury in road traffic accidents that occurred before 31st May 2021 - this is where the total value is under £25,000 but the personal injury element is under £1,000,
• low value personal injury in road traffic accidents that occurred on or after 31st May 2021 where the total value is under £10,000 but the personal injury element is under £5,000,
• disease and illness, 
• clinical negligence, 
• media and communications (claims to do with print or broadcast media, social media, websites, or speech, including defamation),
• construction and engineering,
• professional negligence,
• judicial review,
• housing disrepair (whatever the value),
• possession claims based on rent arrears,
• possession claims based on mortgage or home purchase plan arrears in respect of residential property, and
• claims for damages in relation to the physical state of commercial property at termination of a tenancy.

You can find them at Civil Procedure Rules - Pre-Action Protocols.

The aim of a pre-action protocol is to improve communication between you and the defendant so you both get enough information to decide how likely it is that the case will succeed, and how much the case is worth. As a result, the two of you may become more willing to try and reach an agreement about the dispute (also known as settling a dispute or reaching a settlement) without you needing to start a civil claim. If you decide to start a court case after you have followed the relevant pre-action protocol, you should be in a better-informed position.
Small claims are dealt with by the pre-action protocol for each type of claim. For instance, the Package Travel protocol applies to claims about package holidays valued at no more than £25,000. So, if your claim falls within the limit for a small claim (£10,000 or less) and is about package travel then the Package Travel protocol would apply.

The extent to which you have followed the rules on pre-action conduct will be considered by the court in relation to any court proceedings which follow. For example, the court may order you to pay additional costs resulting from your failure to follow the protocol if you lose the case. Or, if you win your case and are awarded costs by the court, the amount the other side is ordered to pay you may be reduced. (See Failing to follow a pre-action protocol or the rules about pre-action conduct  for more on this).

If a specific pre-action protocol applies to your case

Where a specific pre-action protocol applies to your type of case, have a look at it. It will explain the steps you have to take to provide and exchange information about the claim you are planning to make and give you a pretty clear idea of what is involved.

The first step you have to take is to communicate with the other side providing specific information. You may hear this called a ‘letter of claim’ or a ‘letter before action’ or in some types of case a ‘claim notification form’.

Some pre-action protocols provide a form of template letter with blanks which you have to complete with information relevant to your case. For more on this see the section called letter of claim.

Low value personal injury claims

If you have a personal injury claim where the injury element is worth over £1,500 (or £1000 if the case started before 6th April 2022) and the overall claim is worth under £25,000, then you must start the pre-action protocol in a particular way using an online process called the Claims Portal (except where it is caused by a road traffic accident that occurred on or after May 31st 2021- see Personal Injury claim caused by a car crash below).You may hear this type of claim referred to as a ‘low value’ personal injury claim.

The Claims Portal is available for use by litigants in person as well as lawyers. Currently there is no charge for using the service.

You must use the Claims Portal to notify the other side of your claim if either of the following pre-action protocols applies to your case:

• the Pre-Action Protocol for Low Value Personal Injury Claims in Road Traffic Accidents (this is for claims that are not small claims and so will not use the Official Injury Claim service), and
• the Pre-Action Protocol for Low Value Personal Injury (Employers’ Liability and Public Liability) Claims.

The Claims Portal is designed to take you through a process where the defendant or their insurer is bound by court rules to respond promptly to you when you tell them about your claim. They have to provide you with relevant information, investigate your case within three months, and actively consider whether rehabilitation (for example, medical help such as physiotherapy) is appropriate.

You can find information about the process at Introduction to the process.

You also need to understand the costs consequences of using the Claims Portal.

Personal Injury claim caused by a car crash

If you have a personal injury claim caused by a road traffic accident that occurred on or after May 31st 2021 where the injury element is worth under £5,000 and the overall claim is worth under £10,000, none of the exceptions occur, then you have a small claim and you must instead start the pre-action protocol using an online process called the Official Injury Claim service. See How to make a small claim about injuries caused by a car accident for more guidance.

Pre-action conduct

If there isn’t a specific pre-action protocol that applies to your case, the court will expect you to follow the general rules in the ‘Practice Direction - Pre-Action Conduct’.

These rules describe how the court will normally expect you and the other side to behave before a legal case starts. Essentially this is a ‘cards on the table’ approach. The aim is to encourage early and full information exchange so each side can:

• understand each other’s position,
• make decisions about how to proceed,
• try to settle without starting court proceedings,
• consider some form of Alternative Dispute Resolution, like mediation,
• support the efficient management of the claim, and
• reduce the cost of resolving the claim.

Later, if you do start court proceedings, a court may ask you to explain what you did to  follow the relevant protocol and/or the rules about pre-action conduct before you started court proceedings. If you haven’t followed them you may have to explain why not and the court can impose a sanction. For example, they might order you to pay the other side’s legal costs for behaving unreasonably, even where you would not normally have to.

A court can:

• put the case on hold (called a stay or a stay of proceedings) until you do the things you should have done already,
• order you to pay part or all of the other side side’s costs, or more of the other side’s costs than you would otherwise have had to pay,
• not allow you to claim interest or award you interest at a lower rate than you would otherwise have got on any money the defendant ends up having to pay you, or
• order you to pay interest at a higher rate than would otherwise have been awarded, if you are the defendant and you end up having to pay the claimant money.

This is the letter you have to send to the other side detailing the problem, explaining that you are considering court action, and what you would like them to do to resolve the situation so that you don’t have to go to court.
If there is a pre-action protocol that you have to follow, it may contain a template letter which you can complete with information relevant to your case. If there is no template, the pre-action protocol will include details as to what your letter should contain.

If there isn’t a pre-action protocol that applies to your case, the general pre-action conduct rules give some guidance on the letter. They say that both/all sides should exchange enough information in writing to allow each side to:

• understand each other’s position,
• make decisions about how to proceed,
• try to settle the issues without proceedings,
• consider a form of Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) to help them resolve the dispute,
• support the efficient management of those proceedings, and
• reduce the costs of resolving the dispute.

Bear in mind that following the general pre-action rules should be reasonable – if the dispute is over a small amount of money you do not have to spend ages providing endless details – but you do need to provide enough information for the other side to understand your position. The letter should contain concise details of the claim. It should include the basis on which the claim is made, a summary of the facts, what the claimant wants from the defendant, and if money, how the amount is calculated.

You may find it helpful to look at the template letter for the most relevant pre-action protocol to your type of case, and adapt that.

After you have written your letter of claim, and before starting court proceedings

Once you have written and sent your letter of claim (or notification of claim), you need to allow the other side time to investigate what you have said. You will need to respond promptly to any requests they make for information which will help with their investigation.

The time you have to allow for investigation varies a lot depending on your type of case and the protocol. For example, in a personal injury claim, you are expected to allow the other side 21 days to acknowledge your letter, and a further three months for them to investigate before you start court proceedings, unless by doing this you would miss the deadline, or for some other urgent reason. If you are a business suing an individual over an unpaid invoice (debt) you have to allow them 30 days to respond before starting proceedings.

If there is no pre-action protocol which applies to your claim the general rules for pre-action conduct suggest that the time a defendant should have to investigate and respond may vary from 14 days in a straightforward case to no more than 3 months in a very complex one.

You will need to check any relevant protocol for the appropriate timetable, and put a reminder in your diary so you remember it.

You should use this time to make sure you have gathered and organised as much evidence as possible, so that you are ready to start court proceedings if pre-action negotiations fail or the defendant refuses to co-operate, and also to comply with the court’s timetable.

If your claim is one where you need an expert’s report, you should also try to agree with the other side who that expert is – you will need to read any relevant protocol to find out how to go about this.

You can now make many claims online, but you don’t have to. If you want to use the paper forms you can. However, if you are confident online, as it is easier to use, and your claim will be processed faster. It is also easier to find the right one.

• For claims of £25,000 or less, you can use the Money claims service (also called Online Civil Money Claims or OCMC)
• For claims of £25,001 to £100,000 you might be able to use Money Claim Online.

You cannot use either service for personal injury claims.

You can also find the paper form you need on the GOV.UK website. Each one has a number such as N1 or N244.

This series of guides will help by including a link to the online service or form that are most relevant to each stage in the court process. If you follow the link you will often find Welsh language and large print versions of the same form there as well.

Whether you are filling in a form or using the online service, a large part of it involves giving factual information. Read through each form a couple of times to find out what information it asks for. Then get together the information you need before you start filling it in. Once you have done this, the job may turn out to be a bit easier than you first thought. But sometimes you have to write something more, for example, a statement of the essential facts on which your claim is based. You don’t have to do this in long words and legal language. The best thing is to keep it short and simple. Ask yourself what you want to achieve and focus on that and what is in dispute. Stick to what is relevant and try not to repeat yourself. Never say anything you don’t know to be true and if you are unsure about something, say so.

Most court forms can seem a bit intimidating when you first look at them. Some of them will have guidance notes either built into the form itself, or as an accompanying document.

The most common online services or court forms you will come across are:

• Money Claims service (for claims of up to £25,000) Money Claim Online (for claims of £25,001-£100,000) or the N1 Claim form. Choose one of these to start a claim in the court. N1 has a guidance note which is form N1A.
• Respond to a money claim or the N9 Response pack – the defendant needs to use one of these to respond to the court claim. If the claim was started using the Money claims service the defendant can choose whether to respond online or using the N9 pack. If the claim was started using an N1 form, the defendant has to respond using the paper form. 
• N244 Application notice - a form you need to complete to ask the court to order something, like make an interim order or set aside a judgement. N244 has a guidance note to help you complete it.
• N180 and N181 Directions Questionnaire –In many cases that are not using the online service, both sides need to complete a directions questionnaire to give information about the case and how many witnesses will give evidence on their behalf. The court will then set a timetable for steps to be taken, such as the exchange of documents, witness statements and expert evidence. Directions questionnaires have guidance built into the form. 
• N265 List of documents – In many cases that are not using the online service, both sides complete a list of documents to show what documents they know about that are related to the claim. There is guidance built in.

After completing the relevant form you should send it to the court (this is called “filing it with the court”) and send a copy to the defendant (this is called “serving it on the defendant”). If you use the online service, this happens automatically.

You have to pay court fees at various stages during a court case, in particular:

• when you start your claim (issue fee),
• if you want to make an interim application, that is an application before the final hearing, for example because you need more time to do something,
• before the trial date (hearing fee), and
• to ‘enforce’ a judgement – that is, to force someone to obey a court judgment, for example, to pay you money or to return something belonging to you.

You can find information about civil court fees including enforcement fees, when to pay them and how much they are by reading the Court service leaflet Civil and Family court fees (EX50).

Find out if you can get Getting help to pay a court fee in a civil or family case.

Help with court fees

You may not have to pay a fee at all or only a reduced fee if you are on a low income or certain benefits, and you have little or no savings. For example, you will not pay anything if you can prove that you get Income Support, Income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance, State Pension Guarantee credit, Universal Credit with gross annual earnings of less than £6,000 or income-related Employment and Support Allowance, as long as your savings or other capital don’t exceed certain limits. The savings limit will depend on whether you (or a partner) are under or over 61, and on whether the fee is over or under £1,000.

You can apply for help paying court fees online or by completing form EX160. However, if you are using the online money claim service, you must use the online system for applying for help with fees at the same time. You will apply for Help with fees and receive a decision before the money claim is properly started.

You should make any application for help paying a court fee promptly. If it is refused in full or in part, you will need to pay the fee within a very short time, possibly as little as 7 days or your case may be struck out.

You may also hear help with court fees called ‘fee remission’.

You have to complete a separate application for each court fee you want help paying. This may mean you have to complete this form more than once during your case.

What happens if I don’t pay the court fee?

You cannot start a case without paying the court fee.

If you do not pay other fees as your case progresses, your case will be delayed or struck out. If your case is struck out because you failed to pay a fee, that is the end of your case. You would have to start all over again, if you are still in time and want to pursue your claim.

Even if you don’t have to pay your court fees, you may still have some expenses like photocopying and postage.

If you have a claim for a fixed sum of money, you can either start your case using the online Money claim service or send the N1 form by post to the Civil National Business Centre.

You will only need to find a local county court if your claim is not for a fixed sum of money.

If your claim is not for a fixed or certain sum of money you can find your appropriate local court , its contact details and opening times at GOV.UK court finder.

You can send some documents or communications by email. You can find guidance about what you can and cannot send by email, the required form and content of emails, where to send your email and what the court will do with your email on the Court service website.

It is important you follow the guidance and if you email a document which is not on the ‘approved’ list, it will be treated as having not been sent. Not all documents are accepted by email and if your claim is an online money claim that has been sent to a County Court hearing centre, you should also follow Practice Direction 5B – Communication and filing of documents by email. This could risk you losing your case, or a court ‘striking it out’ (ending your case). There is no extra leeway given to litigants in person in terms of complying with the correct court procedure.

If you don’t follow the correct format with email subject heading, case reference number and so on, the risk is that the court will not deal with it.

Cases are allocated to ‘tracks’ depending on their value and complexity (see section three of Should I sue someone? for more explanation of small claims, fast-track, intermediate track, and multi-track claims)

Small claims will take about one year from start to finish if the case goes to a final hearing.

Fast track claims, intermediate, and multi-track cases (those which are particularly complicated, or a very high value) will take longer.

The actual cost for you to bring a claim will include:

• court fees, if you have to pay them,
• expert’s fees, if you use an expert,
• postage and photocopying expenses,
• travel to court for you and your witnesses,
• loss of earnings for you and your witnesses because of time spent attending court, and
• the value of your time in preparing your case.

The other side will also have some or all of these costs. They may also have the legal cost of employing solicitors and barristers to represent them. This is highly likely if they are an organisation or are covered by insurance, rather than an uninsured individual.

The general rule is that the loser will contribute towards the winner’s costs of the claim but this is more limited in small claims and fast track claims. 

Legal costs

The rules about legal costs can be complicated. This is a summary of the things you should bear in mind at the start of a claim, but you can find more details in our guide Legal Costs and who pays them.

Small claims

A 'small claim' is a claim which is worth under £10,000. 

If you win a small claim, the court will order the other side to pay you the fixed costs involved in starting the claim, the cost of your court fees, any loss of earnings for you and your witnesses in attending court, and travel expenses to get to court for the hearing. You will not get any award to compensate you for the time you have spent preparing your case. If you have been given permission to use an expert (this is rare in small claims) you will not get back more than £750 towards the cost for each expert.

If you lose a small claims case, the court will order you to pay the other side's court fees, their loss of earnings for attending court, and their travel costs. If they have had permission to use an expert’s report (this is rare in small claims) you will not be expected to pay more than £750 towards the cost for each expert.

No-one will be expected to pay the other side's full legal costs. This means that if the other side has employed solicitors to defend the case, and you have behaved reasonably, you will not be expected to pay for those costs if you lose. However, if the court makes an order for costs to someone who it considers has behaved unreasonably, the other side can apply for a court order that those costs be reduced by an amount equal to 50% of the fixed costs which they would otherwise have to pay.   

Civil Procedure Rules 

The court rules that you have to follow when you take someone to court/sue someone.

Claim notification form 

The form you use in certain types of claim to notify a defendant and give them details about your claim in specific types of case.

Claims portal

An online process designed specifically for cases covered by the two pre-action protocols about low value personal injury claims, (except where injuries are caused by a car accident that happened on or after 31st May 2021).

Employer’s liability 

The legal responsibility employers have for their employees if they get injured or become ill as a result of working for the employer’s business.

Letter of claim

A letter, sent to the proposed defendant before court proceedings start, that sets out the basis on which the claim is made, a summary of the facts, what the claimant wants from the defendant, and if that is money, how the amount is calculated.

Letter before action

Another name for a Letter of claim and means the same.

Low value personal injury

These are claims where the total compensation claimed is between £1,000 and £25,000.

Official Injury Claim 

The online system that you need to use if you are making a personal injury claim about injuries that were caused by a car accident on or after 31st May 2021. This service takes you through the pre-action protocol and was designed to be used by claimants who did not have a lawyer to represent them. See our guide about how to use the Official Injury Claim service.

Pre-action protocol 

The name of the procedure the court expects you to follow before you issue your claim in the court. There are specific pre-action protocols for many types of case. The aims are to ensure the parties know what each other’s arguments are, and to encourage parties to resolve the dispute before the claimant starts a court case.

Pre-action conduct 

The name of the procedure and behaviour the court expects you to follow before you issue your claim if there isn’t a specific pre-action protocol that applies to your type of case. The aims are to ensure the parties know what each other’s arguments are, and to encourage parties to resolve the dispute before the claimant starts court proceedings.

Public liability 

The legal responsibility businesses have for the general public when they carry out their business activities.

Sanction 

Action the court can take if you, or the other side, fail to follow a court rule or direction.

Stay

This temporarily suspends or stops any further progress in a case, usually for a set time specified by the court or until one or both parties does something specific required by the court.

Suing 

If you sue someone you start a court process to bring a legal claim against them. This can also be known as taking legal action, bringing a claim, bringing a civil claim, going to court, issuing proceedings, starting legal proceedings or litigation. The purpose of suing is to get the court to make a decision in your favour (called ‘a judgment’) and award a remedy, usually money compensation.

Disclaimer

The information in this guide applies to England and Wales only. The law may be different if you live in Scotland or Northern Ireland. 

The law is complicated. We have simplified things in this guide. Please don’t rely on this guide as a complete statement of the law. We recommend you try and get advice from the sources we have suggested.

The cases we refer to are not always real but show a typical situation. We have included them to help you think about how to deal with your own situation.

Acknowledgements

This guide was produced by Advicenow, with additional material from Laura Bee and Ariane Cossu-Tadayyon. We would like to thank everybody who commented on the updated guide including editorial teams at Thomson Reuters who kindly peer reviewed this updated version.

Advicenow is grateful to the Ministry of Justice for funding the updating of this guide under the Online Support and Advice Grant.

Thanks to the Bar Standards Board for funding the creation of this guide.