Our Top Tips For:
preparing for an upcoming court hearing
The thought of having to attend a court hearing can be terrifying for a multitude of reasons. However, at Pierce & Groves, we frequently help clients ready themselves for upcoming court hearings to ensure that they feel as confident and prepared as possible.
There are many different elements that our clients require assistance with. However, our high level top tips for preparing for an upcoming court hearing are:
Look ahead and make any necessary arrangements to accommodate your preparation – in our experience, the run up to any court hearing can demand a lot of time and attention from the parties themselves in dealing with lawyers’ requests for information, documentation, and providing further instructions. Indeed, preparing for a court hearing can feel like a job in and of itself. As a result, we advise our clients to ask their lawyers to set out all relevant deadlines in advance (or request a copy of the relevant court order, so that we may assist in mapping them out). It is important to know what is expected of you, in order that you can prepare to weave this into your work schedule (which may even include a request for time off or flexible hours), childcare schedule and/or any other pre-existing demands on your time.
Understand the purpose and structure of the hearing – understanding why you are attending the hearing and the structure of the day(s) will help to focus your mind and enable you to prepare accordingly. For example, depending on the type of hearing, it may be that you, and other third parties are to attend to give oral evidence, which may, in turn, mean that the hearing itself will be listed for a longer period of time, or it may be that the hearing is more administrative in nature, and therefore it will likely be shorter and based solely on barristers’ submissions.
If you are giving oral evidence at the hearing, you should know how to address the judge (ask your lawyers or us), and mentally prepare yourself to do so. You should also familiarise yourself with the process of giving evidence (including any additional considerations associated with a remote or an in-person hearing – such as the tech platform to be used or the set-up of the court room), and you may even wish to explore witness familiarisation techniques to use when responding to a question put to you (a service that we offer).
Know your case – whilst you will, of course, already know the details of your case, we strongly recommend refreshing your memory as to key dates or the chronology of events, and re-read key written evidence submitted to the court in support of your case – e.g. applications and witness statements. You may even want to make notes to reinforce the information, with a view to bringing them with you on the day to act as prompts. This way all key details will be fresh in your mind and easy to draw upon, and will also likely help you to follow the arguments made on the day.
Have a clear line of communication with your legal team (and any other support services) – this ties into tip number 1. You will likely want, and need to have a clear line of communication with all key individuals who are assisting you in the lead up to your court hearing. Your legal team will need to take your instructions without much, if any, prior notice, and so the more you can make yourself available to them, the better. You may, in turn, need an additional support service to help you digest any advice given to you, or to convey your instructions in a concise manner, particularly as the high octane nature and speed of developments can often feel quite overwhelming, and many struggle with the pace of the pre-hearing process.
Prepare yourself – remembering to prepare yourself for your court hearing is equally as important as the legal preparatory work. There are many elements to this tip (e.g. see the latter part of tip 2), but as a starting point, we suggest:
o Clearing your day(s) (depending on how long your hearing is listed for) in advance to ensure you have no interruptions or distractions;
o Picking your outfit ahead of time so that you know what you are wearing and there is no panicking on the day;
o Planning your journey e.g. the route you will take and how you will get there etc. – this will help you to avoid unnecessary stress on the day;
o Refraining from reading case related documents late at night – especially ‘position statements’ from the other side – doing so will not help you in the slightest and will only serve to increase negative emotions; and
o Switching off as early as possible and getting a good night’s sleep in order that you feel rested and ready for the day(s) ahead.
Finally, we recommend that our clients think about what their objectives and boundaries are in readiness for the hearing, particularly if there are to be any potential settlement discussions, or an opportunity to put forward additional proposals. In our view, any time where parties, and their respective legal teams are together is, more often than not, a good opportunity to try and narrow issues, if not reach an overall resolution.
