I am taking a builder to the small claims court who breached an agreement arranged by Trustatrader who were useless. I did the application on line and there was only a small section that allowed me to briefly describe my claim. He has been served and I have received a Notice of issue so he has until 27th March to reply.

I have seen there is a N1 claim form that seems to have more space to state the claim and you can send extra pages if necessary, this seems to be a postal application.

My question is what happens now? He is claiming he is now out of work because he has been removed from the above advertising site so I am unlikely to get anything out of him anyway but I shall give it ago.

I have reams of evidence against him from a week in when he decided to walk away and refuse contact with me. There was also a situation that could have killed or seriously injured someone and I have pictorial evidence.

When do I get to state all this as I understand your case in some instances can be strong enough for there to be a judgement without a hearing. He has already admitted liability from emails sent and the fact that he signed an agreement to pay me.

I know not to contact the court as they don't give out any advice and have tried getting through to Citizens Advice. I think he will defend his case in order to get a judgement that will allow him to pay over several years at least that's what he said in an email. I want to get over in writing before any hearing what this builder did to me and the extra debt I found my self in, not to mention the stress. I also don't want to arrive at a hearing and have to go over it I would rather it was there in black and white so I can have a clear mind to answer any issues that may arise.

Any advice greatly appreciated

you seem to have missed the part on your money claim applicationwhich allows you to indicate by taking a checkbox that you wish to send a fuller and more detailed particulars of claim separately once your brief electronic claim has been issued.

This would have allowed you to put in your brief details and then within seven days to send off a more detailed statement of your claim.

Secondly, you should be aware that if you really think that you are unlikely to get anything out of him – if you get a judgement, is there any real point in going ahead? In addition to your claim fee, you will have to pay a hearing fee. I don't know what the value of your claim is that this could amount to £300 or £400 and if he has no money then you will be able to get that back. Have you considered that?

The automatic judgement that you are referring to is known as "summary judgement" but it is highly unusual to apply for summary judgement in a small claim. It would cost you at least £155 to make the application for it and there is a big chance that the judge might refuse your application in which case your application fee is money down the drain.

You have certainly come to the right place here for advice. However, it's a shame that you didn't come here before you started the claim and started incurring expenses. also, it is never a good idea to start suing people unless you understand what you're doing in advance and you understand what the next steps are. Suing people in the county court is not difficult – but you really ought to understand the subject first.

I think that it will be helpful if you will post up your claim form in PDF format so we can see exactly what is going on.I understand that the defendant has not yet filed a defence. When he does, then you should post a PDF of this as well.

Thanks for your reply

I really don't recall seeing any box to send any extra information as I did it online not postal. I am kicking myself. I decided to go ahead with the court application because a payment was due on 28/2/17 and when I did not receive it I thought that's it. He has put in a insurance claim on his public liability but that will cover about 25% of what I am asking for. I am asking for his fees back, the cost of remedial work, the cost of wall unis and contents, the latter two are items on the insurance claim.

He only informed me he was out of work after I told him he would be going to court as he claims he no longer has any work since being removed from Trustatrader had I known his company was out of work I would have thought twice. He is still showing on Rated People. I can post the claim in pdf do I scrub out my /his details.

The POC are restricted to 24 lines of 45 characters and a total of 1080 characters. If you type more than this the last part of your text will not appear on the claim. Please be aware that the website will only accept the following punctuation; full stop, comma, pound signs.

If you do not have enough space to explain your claim online and you need to serve extra, more detailed particulars on the defendant, please tick the box that appears after the statement ‘you may also send detailed particulars direct to the defendant’.

Please be aware this will then reduce the amount of space left in the main particulars box by three lines. This is because a statement is automatically added explaining you will be serving further particulars.

You will be able to see the extra information added in the next screen “Summary”. For more information please see the ‘Serving additional Particulars of Claim’ section.

If you have enough space to explain your claim online do not tick this box.

Thread moved to General Legal Issues.

Regards

Andy