Steven Wade is a family law advisor (McKenzie Friend) with nearly 20 years of experience helping people represent themselves in court. Having been through the system personally and supported thousands of others since, he knows what it’s like to face the stress, confusion, and pressure of doing it alone. This blog shares practical insights that empower you to take control of your case — without the legal jargon or the hefty solicitor’s bill.
How to appeal
Family Law Assistance
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How to appeal
- Introduction
- Should I even consider an appeal?
- Do you have grounds to appeal?
- What’s the appeal process?
- Is it even worth appealing?
- Conclusion
Introduction
I’m not trying to put you off appealing. There are sometimes very good reasons to do so and appeals do happen and do succeed.
The bad news is that you will probably be unsuccessful if you try – and not liking what was ordered is not a good enough to start the process either. There is a high chance that you’ll come to the conclusion that appealing in the first place is not the right course of action and try something else to get the result you want. Usually there IS a better way too.
If appealing is the best option though? There’s a clear process to appeal an order that has been made by a court. The actual process is quite simple. The hard bit is convincing a court that your application makes merit and after you have done so there is more hard work to be done.
Appeals are a `last resort’ and there are times you should make them and times when you most definitely should not.
Should I even consider an appeal?
Before appeal it’s important to ask yourself a few questions.
Because appeals are deliberately expensive, laborious and there is a good chance they’re going to fail – even if the court has made a mistake.
It makes sense when you think about it. There are a huge number of orders made every day in the Family Court and let’s be honest – there are even more unhappy people who are unhappy with what was ordered. They include decisions about where children live, where they spend their time, go to school and much more. For finance hearings it’s about the division of assets and liabilities.
Real `life and death’ stuff. And from a risk/benefit point of view an appeal can seem appealing (pardon the pun!) when there is so much at stake. If you have nothing to lose (in terms of money, effort, heartbreak and time) – why wouldn’t someone appeal a result they weren’t happy with?
So if appeals were that easy, quick (and cheap) there would be every incentive for anyone who didn’t like an order to automatically appeal it for a `second bite of the cherry‘.
If you’re considering an appeal you will need to weigh up the cost, the work and the delay it is going to impose on your case. This last point is something you absolutely need to think about, especially if you are appealing an order in a case that is still running – it could be counterproductive. A good example of this would be a case dealing with child matters or finances where an appeal puts everything on hold until the appeal outcome is reached; in the time the appeal is holding things up there can be no further progress and you’re effectively gambling on an appeal judge giving you the result you want.
It’s effectively a `double or quits’ scenario.
Do you want to take that risk?
Do you have grounds to appeal?
As I say above – you cannot appeal an order because you just don’t like it.
We’re contacted by a huge number of people who want to appeal and when we ask what their grounds are they’ll say something like `What sort of grounds are there?’
The point here is that if you are looking for reasons to appeal…you probably don’t have them. It’s the same as the old James Dean `Rebel Without a Cause’ answer – when he’s asked what he’s rebelling against and he asks `What have you got?‘
People who contact us about appeals with these questions are effectively asking us `Can you go through the huge number of documents with a magnifying glass and see if you can find anything?’
To do this can take a considerable amount of time to go through a trial bundle…only for us to suck our teeth and say `You know – I don’t think you have much prospect of a chance of succeeding here so you probably need to think about not appealing’. This often leaves them thinking they’ve spent a lot of cash to be told to forget about it. Sometimes they (quite rightly) ask themselves `Why did I spend a LOT of cash only told they can’t help me?
That said – there ARE times an appeal can succeed. Grounds for appeal include the decision was:
- Wrong
- Unjust because of a serious procedural or other irregularity in proceeding.
Examples of the above can include the Court not following the `rules’ it has to follow in a whole host of situations concerning inclusion/exclusion of evidence, hearings that haven’t been run properly, decisions that are drastically inappropriate, etc.
It’s also important to remember that an appeal court will need to take into account that a judge who has made a decision has had the benefit of listening to and seeing witnesses which may give them an insight no one else has – which means it has to be very sure it is making the right decision.
If you want some `bed time’ reading the landmark case for is Piglowska v Piglowski [1999] 2 FLR 763(!)
That’s not all, either. The Court could decide you’re right…but do nothing. Read that again. The Court could design you’re right and do nothing (well – other than say you have a point, legally speaking). You could be told that even though the points you raise are valid, accurate and fair that even if that was the case, the same order would have been made.
You will be in the position of being told you’re right…but nothing will be done. Nothing will change.
What is the appeal process?
An appeal needs to be in a higher Court than the order you’re appealing is made was in. So if the order was made by magistrates it needs to heard by a judge, one made by a judge needs to be heard by a circuit level judge (or higher), etc. This doesn’t mean you can instantly take it to the highest court in the land (i.e. the Supreme Court or the European Court of Human Rights).
The form to complete to make an appeal is an N161 with the fee (usually it’s £569).
But you need to be sending off more than just this form and fee.
You are going to need to complete bundle too. This bundle is not the one that will have been heard in the hearing that resulted in the order you are appealing either. In a way, your appeal is a separate case (it’s a case about the order) which means you need to compose one from scratch, demonstrating the strength of your argument. You may need a transcript of the hearing too.
The next step is that you will hear back from the court as to whether your appeal will be taken further.
If so, the court will order a hearing and you’ll have an opportunity to convince the judge you have a point. If that’s the case it is possible that the original order will be rescinded and the previous one will remain in place.
Is it even worth appealing?
It depends on the situation.
If you have an existing case running for your children and there are hearings every 3 months every order is an interim order. Meaning that even if you dislike the order made profoundly it may be changed at the next hearing. If you appeal this, order your case will be put on hold and if the appeal process takes, say, 6 months, you’re going to be stuck with that hated order for at least that time. And as I say above…even the court agrees that they broke the rules, didn’t look at evidence they should done, etc. you could still be told `We’re leaving the order as it is’.
In a way it’s a `Double or Quits’ situation that you get to pour serious time, money and effort into – with you walking away with less than what you walked in with.
If it’s a final order – be it for children or finances that could be a different matter because it’s a `settled’ matter. Whether it is worth doing depends on what is at stake, what your chances are of winning and what it is going to cost for making an application in the first place.
You may decide that you can win, but it isn’t worth it or vice versa. Ultimately, it’s a decision only you can make. Choose wisely!
Conclusion
Most of the time it isn’t worth appealing because of the reasons I outline above. If you decide to go down this route you could pay a considerable amount of money for a solicitor (or someone like us) to go through your documents and say it probably isn’t worth making that application and doing so will only cost you ever more, before your appeal is denied.
Appeals are deliberately costly, time-consuming, onerous and have a high bar because if they weren’t…it’d be `worth a punt’, basically asking the judge to go away and see if he/she can come up with another decision.
This post is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice.
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