Responding to damages claims online becomes mandatory

From 15 September 2022, defence solicitors must use the HMCTS online portal to respond to any damages claims issued online.

In April 2022, it became compulsory to issue civil damages claims covered by practice direction PD 51ZB via HM Courts and Tribunals Service's (HMCTS) online portal.

Find out how to issue a claim online

From 15 September 2022, users wishing to respond to claims issued online must:

Responding to claims

Make sure your firm is registered with MyHMCTS. It may take a couple of days for new accounts to be set up.

Once registered, check the list of unallocated cases on your MyHMCTS dashboard regularly so you can:

  1. identify new cases
  2. allocate these to a solicitor

You must respond online to claims that are issued via the online portal on or after 15 September 2022.

Any paper responses filed at the County Court Money Claims Centre will be returned, unless you can give an acceptable reason for not using the digital portal.

Once you've responded

Only responses that ‘reject all of the claim’ will continue within the online portal.

If you respond in any other way, the claim will drop out of the online portal and proceed via the paper route.

Using the damages claims portal

The damages claims portal allows users to:

  • track claims' progress with automatic email updates
  • allocate cases to litigators in your firm, to cover annual leave or supervision

Your MyHMCTS dashboard will show you the latest activity on claims you’re managing.

Setting up multiple users in a firm

You are not restricted by how many litigators can use the service.

The account administrator for your firm can create and manage your MyHMCTS account, meaning you do not need to contact HMCTS to add or remove users.

Resources

Damages claim portal guidance for professional users – from issue to response (PDF 2.8 MB)

Webinar showing the journey from issuing a claim to response

Download a list of frequently asked questions (Word 421 KB)

Find out how to create an account with MyHMCTS 

If you're experiencing issues with the MyHMCTS platform, email damagesclaims@justice.gov.uk.