You have been served: what to do, and how long you have

A document from the court is not a notification. It starts a clock the moment it reaches you. Many recipients put it aside in alarm, or wait to ask someone over the weekend, and find when they look again that the deadline has gone. The harm done by waiting a few days at this stage is often harder to repair than the dispute itself.

It is also common for the summons never to reach the recipient's hand at all. It may be affixed to the door of the house or the company's office, or handed to another person living there. The law treats service in that form as valid, so saying afterwards that you never saw it is not always an answer.

What kind of document did you receive?

Several different documents are loosely called a court summons, and each calls for something different. Read the heading: what kind of document it is, which court issued it, the case number, and who the claimant is.

• A civil summons with a copy of the claim means you are being sued as defendant and a defence must be filed within the period. This is the most urgent of all.
• A notice of hearing sets a date in a case already under way, either for hearing or for judgment. You must attend or have a lawyer appear for you.
• A witness summons means you are required to give evidence or produce documents. It does not mean you are being sued, but ignoring it has consequences.
• A criminal summons, or notice of a preliminary hearing, belongs to a different process with heavier consequences. Consult a lawyer immediately.
• A writ of execution comes after judgment and means the other side is moving to seize or attach assets.

Occasionally the document is not from a court at all, but a demand letter from a law office formatted to resemble an official notice. A genuine summons names the court, carries a case number and bears the court's seal. If in doubt, the court named can be contacted directly using that case number.

How many days do you have?

In an ordinary civil case the defence is due within fifteen days of service. But the day the count begins is not the same in every situation, and this is where most mistakes are made.

• Served in person, or on someone living or working at the address: time runs from the day of delivery.
• Affixed to the house or place of business: service takes effect only once fifteen days have passed from the day it was posted, and the fifteen days for the defence then start to run, giving thirty days in all from the day of posting.
• A defendant domiciled outside Thailand is given far longer. Service in person abroad takes effect after sixty days, service by a substitute method after seventy-five, service on the defendant or an agent carrying on business in Thailand after thirty, and a notice posted at the court after sixty.
• In consumer and small claims the court often fixes a hearing date in the summons itself, requiring the defence before that date or allowing it to be given orally on the day. Read the wording of your own summons rather than relying on what is generally said.

If the time really is too short, a lawyer can apply to extend the period for filing the defence. There must be proper grounds and the application must be made before the deadline expires. Applying afterwards requires proof of circumstances beyond control, which is a far harder case to make.

What to do in the first week

• Photograph or scan every page, including the envelope, and record the date of receipt at once. That date is the starting point for everything that follows.
• Read the claim through: what is alleged, how much is sought, and which documents are annexed.
• Gather your own records on the matter — contracts, receipts, transfer slips, message threads — without filtering them. Let the lawyer decide what matters.
• Check that the name and address on the summons are actually yours. Claims are sometimes brought against the wrong person where names coincide, and that must be raised in the correct form.
• Contact a lawyer and give the date of service, not just an image of the papers.

What not to do is telephone the claimant to argue, or agree a figure over the phone. What is said now can later be produced as an admission of the debt, and it may interrupt a limitation period that had already run, which helps the other side. At this stage contact should go through a lawyer.

What if the deadline has already passed?

Where no defence is filed in time, the court may hear the case in the defendant's absence and give judgment against them. The law still allows an application for a rehearing, but it must show that the default was neither deliberate nor careless, and that had the case been defended the outcome might have been different.

The window for that application is short. As a rule it must be filed within fifteen days of service of the order enforcing the judgment, and even where good reasons prevented that, the law imposes a final outer limit. Anyone who has just discovered that judgment was entered against them must act immediately. Waiting to see what the other side does forfeits the right entirely.

Conversely, if service was defective from the start — sent to an address where the defendant never had a domicile, for instance — that is an objection to be raised through the correct channel and within time, not merely asserted orally.

This article sets out general principles and is not advice on any particular matter. The applicable deadline depends on the type of document, the method of service and the category of case. If you have been served, send images of every page together with the date of receipt to the firm without delay.