NIPC Law

Leeds Law Courts (c) 2005 Jane Lambert: all rights reserved Jane Lambert Until the Civil Procedure Rules ( "CPR" ) came into force in 1999 solicitors specializing in intellectual property law heralded litigation with an ultimatum called a letter before action . Written in haughty if not insulting terms and accompanied by a humiliating form of undertakings, they were intended to shock the recipient into submission. They rarely achieved the desired result. As often as not they were simply ignored.  Occasionally, they were answered by a defiant response.  As a result, a lot of actions were launched that could easily have been settled without recourse to litigation. As I wrote in Dispute Resolution   all that was supposed to change with the introduction of Pre-Action Protocols and the Practice Direction-Pre-Action Conduct and Protocols : "The objective of the Practice Direction and the Pre-Action Protocols is to enable the parties to identify the ...

CPR 63.20 (2)  requires those bringing claims in the Intellectual Property Enterprise Court ( "IPEC" ) including the small claims track to state whether they have complied with paragraph 7.1(1) and Annex A (paragraph 2) of the Practice Direction (Pre-Action Conduct). If they don't the defendant has an extra 28 days in which to file his or her defence under CPR 63.22 (3).  But if you actually turn to the Practice Direction - Pre-Action Conduct  you will find that the old paragraph 7 and Annex A aren't there any more. That is because the practice direction was updated on 29 April 2015. In their place, paragraph 6 provides: "Steps before issuing a claim at court 6. Where there is a relevant pre-action protocol, the parties should comply with that protocol before commencing proceedings. Where there is no relevant pre-action protocol, the parties should exchange correspondence and information to comply with the objectives in paragraph 3, bearing in mind that com...