HM Courts and Tribunals Service

3. Ms O complains about the service she received from HM Courts and Tribunals Service. She complains that:

• HMCTS stated she had agreed to pay costs that she had not, and she was given conflicting information about how and when she should have disputed this • HMCTS took two months to reply to an email Ms O sent on 3 August 2022 • HMCTS advised Ms O on 6 January 2023 that she would be contacted, but no contact was made. Her cased was later closed because she had not contacted HMCTS. She should not have been expected to chase HMCTS as they had said they would make contact.

• She was given conflicting information about how much she would need to pay and not advised she could apply for help with fees.

• A request for mediation made in April 2024 to avoid attending court was not considered • She was told on 18 March 2024 that she was out of time to submit a D11, despite not having been previously told she needed to complete one.

4. Ms O explained that as a result of these events, including the length of the process and the unprofessional and misleading responses, she has suffered anxiety, depression, loss of sleep and PTSD. These has in turn retraumatised her following the previous domestic abuse which led to the divorce.

5. By bringing the complaint to us, Ms O is seeking for an explanation to questions that HMCTS has not answered.

6. She believes a formal apology and compensation would be appropriate.

7. Ms O separated from her former partner, Mr Knight, in January 2022, due to domestic abuse and coercive control, and explained that the abuse escalated after this.

8. In February 2022, a judge placed an Occupation Order on Mr Knight for three months, which was later extended for a further nine months. Despite this, Mr Knight was arrested on several occasions for further stalking, harassment and coercive control.

9. Mr Knight began divorce proceedings on 13 January 2022, and Ms O disputed the reasons given in the petition. She also said that as she was only working part-time and not receiving child maintenance from Mr Knight (despite both their children living with her), she would not cover any costs.

10. On 2 August 2022, the Judge ordered Ms O pay costs (though no amount was agreed). She appealed the decision through the divorce team at HMCTS. Ms O says she was sent an email by HMCTS on 6 January 2023 stating she would be contacted, and so she believed she had nothing she needed to do except wait.

11. A Child Arrangement Order (CAO) was made, and after a number of hearings, Mr Knight was granted sold custody of their daughter, and Ms O was not to make contact (this order ends in November 2025). A hearing in February 2024 found that their son should live with Mr Knight but spend time with Ms O as well. Their son at the time did not want to see Ms O, so the Judge requested Mr Knight encourage their sone having a relationship with Ms O. However, Ms O has now not seen her son since January 2024 (despite making efforts to reach out to him).

12. The law (namely the Parliamentary Commissioner Act 1967) says a person needs to make their complaint to us or their MP within a year of becoming aware of the problem. We cannot investigate complaints brought to us after one year, unless we consider there is a good reason to do so.

13. We have discussed this with Ms O to understand the reasons why she could not do so. We have also considered the time the organisation has taken to respond to Ms O.

14. The points of complaint that Ms O is looking for us to investigate mostly stem from 2022/23, with the most recent being from 18 March 2024.

15. According to HMCTS, the first time Ms O raised any formal complaint was on 25 March 2025. Ms O had stated on her complaint form that she had been complaining about these issues for a number of years, and so we approached her for more information on this.

16. She confirmed that discussions about the issues had been ongoing for a long time, but agreed that her first complaint was made in March of this year.

17. As Ms O was unable to provide detail of anything that prevented her from raising a complaint sooner, we would have no reason to set aside the time limit.

1. We have carefully considered Ms O’s complaint about HM Courts and Tribunals Service (HMCTS). We were very sorry to read about the events which led to her contacting us and recognises that this has been a very stressful and difficult time.

2. We have found that the complaint falls outside of our time limit, and we have decided there is no good reason for us to put our time limit aside to consider it further