BL-2021-000228 - [2025] EWHC 2222 (Ch)

The second defendnat’s say in circumstances where the Extension Orders are to be set aside, it is difficult to see how an application under the more stringent requirements of CPR 7.6(3) could succeed. In any event:

So far as CPR 7.6(3) is concerned Zuckerman summarises its effect as follows at [5.96]:

“the rule-maker’s intention that a claimant should be able to obtain a retrospective extension only if they are free of blame for the failure to serve in time, and only if they have acted with reasonable alacrity to put things right once the period of service has expired. The rule reflects the importance attached to service by the due deadline so as to ensure that the process of service is not unnecessarily dragged out and that defendants are not unduly deprived of the benefit of limitation.”

The jurisdictional thresholds of CPR 7.6(3) are not met. Even if they were, the Court should not exercise its discretion to grant retrospective relief in circumstances where the Extension Orders have been set aside and the effect of doing so would be to deprive the Defendants of a limitation defence some eighteen months after limitation expired.

Lacey v Palmer Marine Services Ltd [2019] EWHC 112 is authority that it is impermissible to circumvent CPR 7.6(3) by an order dispensing with service pursuant to CPR 6.16.

The second defendant says it would be perverse if a claimant could achieve precisely that which Lacey forbids in respect of CPR 6.16 by instead seeking an order under CPR 6.15 that steps already taken (after the claim form had expired) amount to good service. As Zuckerman explains at 5.111, by reference to both CPR 6.15 and 6.16:

“However, the policy articulated by the Court of Appeal, that the power to permit service by an alternative method should not be used as an ex post facto ruse for rectifying defective service or as a way of extending the period for service independently of CPR 7.6, remains good law. CPR 6 was amended in 2008 so that the power to make an order for alternative service is governed by CPR 6.15 and the power to dispense with service by CPR 6.16. The policy of refusing to use these escape routes has, however, been maintained and the court will not normally come to the aid of a claimant who failed to serve the claim form in time by making an order under these provisions.”