Coal Pension Properties Limited v Mace Living Limited & Ors

Service of a claim form on a defendant’s solicitors requires clear written notification that the solicitors are instructed to accept service. General conduct of litigation, agreement to procedural extensions, or an email footer concerning electronic correspondence is insufficient.

Electronic service must also comply with Practice Direction 6A, including any requirement to ask about limitations and any specified recipient addresses. Retrospective validation under CPR 6.15 depends on the circumstances as a whole. Knowledge of the claim form is necessary but insufficient, and loss of an accrued limitation defence is relevant prejudice. Careless failure to follow the rules, particularly where service was left until late, will ordinarily provide no good reason for validation.

The claimant issued a substantial construction claim and obtained successive consensual extensions for service of the claim form. On the final day, it emailed the claim form and Particulars of Claim to the defendants’ solicitors. The solicitors’ email footers had referred first to email service during the Covid-19 disruption and later to electronic correspondence subject to specified conditions.

The claimant subsequently delivered paper copies to security officers, but after the relevant deadline. It sought declarations that the email service was valid, alternatively an order under CPR 6.15 validating the service, and further relief concerning service of the Particulars of Claim. The defendants sought dismissal and declarations that the court lacked jurisdiction. The central issues were whether the solicitors had notified the claimant that they were authorised to accept service, whether the email service complied with Practice Direction 6A, and whether retrospective validation was justified.

1. Validity of service. The claimant’s email service on 2 February 2026 was invalid. Under CPR 6.7(1)(b), the defendant’s solicitor must notify the claimant in writing that the solicitor is instructed to accept service of the claim form. The draft Form N244, read objectively, concerned extensions for the Letter of Claim and service of the claim form. It did not notify the claimant that the defendants’ solicitors had authority to accept service. The court applied the approach to objective construction described in Actavis Group HF v Eli Lilly & Co. [2013] EWCA Civ 517.
2. The court applied LSREF 3 Tiger Falkirk Limited I S.a.r.L. v Paragon Building Consultancy Ltd [2021] EWHC 2063 (TCC). The Covid footer indicated willingness, or a requirement, to accept documents by email for Practice Direction 6A paragraph 4.1, but did not provide the separate notification required by CPR 6.7. It also did not satisfy paragraph 4.2 because the claimant had not first asked about limitations on electronic service.
3. The replacement footer displaced the Covid footer because the claimant had received it in a very substantial number of emails and was thereby on notice of the changed position. It required service both at the specified service address and by copying the lawyer with conduct. The claimant’s email did not comply with those requirements. The purported service was therefore invalid.
4. CPR 6.15. The court applied the principles summarised in The Queen ex p. The Good Law Project v The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care [2022] EWCA Civ 355. The relevant factors included whether reasonable steps had been taken to serve in accordance with the rules, whether the defendant knew the contents of the claim form before expiry, and the prejudice caused by validation. Knowledge of the claim form was favourable to the claimant but was not sufficient by itself.
5. The claimant had not taken reasonable steps. It had not asked whether the solicitors had authority to accept service and had left service until a late stage. The defendants had a well arguable limitation defence in contract and tort. Depriving them of that accrued defence constituted relevant prejudice. The court found no special circumstance amounting to good reason for retrospective validation. The application under CPR 6.15 was dismissed.
6. The alternative application under CPR 3.1 and CPR 3.9 did not arise because it depended on CPR 6.15 relief being granted. The claimant’s application was dismissed and the defendants’ application for declarations succeeded. The court did not decide the defendants’ novel argument that CPR 6.15 was unavailable where an otherwise permitted method of service had been used incorrectly.