HM Courts and Tribunals Service

2. Ms F complains about HMCTS’s handling of a court hearing for a Single Justice Procedure Notice (SJPN) in October 2021. She complains HMCTS did not tell her about the hearing which was heard in her absence. HMCTS relisted her case for a hearing in February 2022, which was later changed to March 2022 and she complains HMCTS did not send her information she wanted for the hearing.

3. Ms F says HMCTS’s actions caused her stress. Ms F wants financial compensation for the amount she was fined by HMCTS.

4. Ms F was given a SJPN (a charge of a minor criminal offence against an individual or a company where the case may be decided by a magistrate without going to court) with a hearing in October 2021. This was heard in her absence. She said she told HMCTS she did not receive the SJPN and her case was relisted for February 2022. Ms F said she asked for an adjournment (to postpone) due to COVID-19 symptoms. The court agreed to adjourn the case to March 2022.

5. Ms F said she emailed HMCTS the day before the hearing to ask for information on her case. She did not attend the hearing. The application to reopen the case was dismissed with the original fine from October 2021 imposed by the court. HMCTS issued a Further Steps Notice (FSN) on 21 March 2022 telling Ms F the fine of £2,021 was overdue for payment.

8. Our Principles explain how public organisations should act. They say:

‘Public bodies should treat people with sensitivity, bearing in mind their individual needs, and respond flexibly to the circumstances of the case. Where appropriate, they should deal with customers in a co-ordinated way with other providers to ensure their needs are met; and, if they are unable to help, refer them to any other sources of help.’

9. The information Ms F gave us includes her concerns about the case being heard in her absence as she says she did not receive the SJPN. We can see HMCTS agreed to list the case for reopening and this action was in line with our Principles.

10. The case was due to be heard in March 2022 and Ms F emailed HMCTS to ask for information the day before. HMCTS did not respond to this request before the hearing. We have not seen anything that might have stopped Ms F from attending court in March 2022, where she could have told it about not getting the information. We asked Ms F why she could not attend the hearing and she did not give any more information on this.

11. Our Principles say public bodies should deal with people within reasonable timescales. Ms F’s request for information the day before the hearing did not give HMCTS time to deal with her request. While we appreciate Ms F may have been unwell during this time she knew about the hearing since November 2022. She was also given more time to ask for information after the case was adjourned from February to March 2022.

12. We have seen an email from Ms F to HMCTS in November 2021 saying she received the wrong form. In its replies to Ms F, HMCTS said it would be the police who would send any communication relating to the offence and the plea. It said she would need to contact the police and that HMCTS did not send her the form. We have not seen anything to say HMCTS did not act correctly by not dealing with Ms F’s request before the hearing. It is not reasonable to expect HMCTS to respond in such a short time and it correctly referred her to the police in November 2021 for more information on the offences. Ms F could have got the information sooner or raised concerns during the hearing which she did not attend.

13. We can see Ms F feels strongly about her complaint and we were sorry to learn about its impact on her.

1. We have carefully considered Ms F’s complaint about HM Courts and Tribunals Service (HMCTS) and we have not seen any signs that anything went seriously wrong. For this reason we will not be taking any further action but we are sorry to hear about Ms F’s complaint and how she says she was affected.