Thread: HELP!! allocation/case managment confrence hearing?

could you please post the core of the letter her ie. District Judge Dudley ordered/requested

Cheers AL

Pete if you can type in the letter you received we will be at a better advantage to offer you advice !

Mat pm a mod and let them know whats happened they will guide you in the right direction.

AL

There are notes on this in the general forum about staying and about the doodaa court conference.

This is what I have made of it from those posts:
The DooDaa conference.
this is basically the higher judge taking a bundle of similar cases (so maybe not all the same bank) and trying to force the banks hand into turning up so a judgement can be passed in the courts. Once this is done, and they lose, then the lower judge can re-open all the stayed (suspended I suppose) cases and dismiss the defences.

They would want to do this because it costs them time and money, and as yet a case hasn'y made it to court - imagine their frustration as well! - so they want to push the banks into allowing a test trial to go through. Then other judges (from all over the country) can start to say 'Claimaint wins as the defence has been struck out'. Many judges seem to be of the opinion that the banks are being particularly annoying as they get to the last minute and settle, meaning wasted court time and so I would assume lots of empty voids for them, but also a backlog of cases!

In the DooDaa conference you will have the opportunity to put your views forward, and can lean on past cases, laws and acts as evidence - but neither is allowed a physical witness to attend. It isn't actually a hearing, but a means of trying to decide what would happen at a hearing.

If you have had your court claimed stayed, it is because the judge is wanting to wait on the outcome of the DooDaa conference to basically be informed as to who to find in favour of. An interesting thing that I think Bankfodder mentioned is that in the conference you can ask for the bank/s to submit standard disclosure meaning that the bank would have to explain it's charging system and costs - the thing they do not want to do!

from what I have read, most of the banks will submit before the hearing (knowing what could happen to them!) and so pay out as per a normal hearing date.

I will admit this is my own surmise of the whole doodaa conference and staying issues, so please have a read of them yourselves.

The main thing again is not to worry, if you go, don't rely on statements you don't understand, and be frank and honest about why you believe the charges are wrongful.

I would think you won't have to go - ring the bank and give them a push and a nudge...you never know!

Hope that helps a bit

Peter

First of all there is nothing to be worried about. This is not hearing. It is not a trial. It is merely a meeting to arrange the logistics of the final trial including whether there would be any witnesses if evidence will be taken and of course the judge is curious to know which banks will still be defending the case. Let me say that it is unlikely that any banks will be defending. However you must assume that the bank will be there and that you will have to argue your case when the final hearing occurs.

The bank may be represented at the case management conference but it is entirely possible that it will not bother to be there.

However you must assume that the bank will be there and it will want to represent its own interests and that it will try to introduce suggestions for the final conduct of the trial.

One question that you need to know is whether the court is sitting as a county court or as the mercantile court. I suggest that the court is telephoned or even written to in order to ascertain this. If the court is sitting as a mercantile court then this brings us into a completely new dimension because then you are dealing with a branch of a High Court. In that case I would recommend that you all start posting in the mercantile court Forum which is off General.

I would suggest that you attend the conference if you at all can. It will be useful for the experience and also to meet other people. Also very importantly I would recommend very strongly that you ask the judge to make an order for standard disclosure. If the bank is there they will try to object to this.

If you ask one of the mods they will tell you where we have a draft proposed directions template which has already been put forward to several judges in the country and accepted as a set of directions. It is well drafted and at the mercantile court in London, the judge even remarked that it was an extremely intelligently structured document. I suggest that you get a copy of this make sure that is adapted to your own particular needs and that you offer it to the judge as a set of proposed directions. You should do this almost at the outset of the conference. Maybe even better, you should send it to the judge with a note that you will be asking for him to adopt the proposal as a direction. You must take a separate copy to the court as well and check that he has already received it.

You will not need to go into the conference armed with arguments and cases and ready to make your point. This is not a trial

You will need to ask for standard disclosure or at least disclosure according to our proposed directions. You will need to make sure that the time limits arelong enough to give you an opportunity to consider any documents that might be revealed by the bank.

You also need to try and keep the cases allocated to the small claims track. So you will be arguing to the judge that the matter is uncomplicated involves no difficult or unusual question of law and that it is really just a question of fact. You will be arguing that the case has a relatively small value and that it is suitable for the small claims track. You will have to argue that on the other hand, despite it being a small claims matter, that they should be standard disclosure or something approaching standard disclosure (see our proposed directions). Point out to the judge that disclosure orders have been made against banks around the country even though cases have been allocated to small claims tracks.
It will help you to go to our litigation concluded section and to make a complete listing on spreadsheet of or league claims which have been settled giving defendant bank, claim number, amount settled,. This should impress upon the judge -- in case he is not already aware of it -- the abusive nature of the bank's litigation technique. This will also be a good argument to support your application for disclosure.

Finally if you look in the Lloyd's Forum you will notice that a judge in Lincoln has now started making orders threatening to strike out defences because he believes that the banks are simply litigating in an abusive fashion.

Get hold of a copy of this order, turn it into a proposed direction and offer that also to the judge in Southend.

If you can come after the hearing with the order for disclosure and an order threatening striking out of defence for abusive litigation then you will have done extremely well and I think that both of these orders are within your grasp if you want.

A final suggestion is that you should start posting around the Forum and fined up who else is involved in this south end hearing.
If anybody can compile a list of users for me together with the banks that they are suing, I would be very grateful. I'm sure that we can find a good use for it.

If anyone goes to the conference in Southend, I would be very grateful if you could get the contact details of any other litigants there including their userid if they belong to The Consumer Action Group. If they are not one of our group then I would recommend that you suggest to them that they register with us immediately.