UAE BARQ برق الإمارات – نبضك
His Highness Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Presidential Affairs, and President of Abu Dhabi Judicial Department (ADJD), signed a decision establishing the Small Claim Court, based on the strategic priority of the Judicial Department to achieve an accomplished justice and build confidence in the judicial system in a way that contributes to enhance the competitive position of the Emirate of Abu Dhabi.
His Excellency Youssef Saeed Al-Abri, Undersecretary of the Abu Dhabi Judicial Department, affirmed the commitment of the UAE’s enlightened leadership to establish a legislative and judicial infrastructure to organise litigation procedures, particularly small cases in terms of the value of the claim, by reducing the number of measures taken in order to shorten the adjudication time in comparison to ordinary litigation procedures, and in line with the standards of global competitiveness.
The Undersecretary of the ADJD stated that the decision to establish the Small Claims Court guarantees a speedy adjudication of cases and preserves at the same time the rights of all parties, as the court has the jurisdiction to settle civil, commercial and labour disputes in addition to salary claims of less than AED 500,000 of value. The final decisions of this Court are rendered at the same hearing, Mr. Al Abri said.
The decision to establish the Small Claims Court has provided a mechanism to expedite the case preparation. The said procedure shall be finalised within 15 days as of the date of registration of the case, which period can be extended for a similar period only by a decision of the supervising judge, and the decision ending the litigation shall be issued in one and same hearing during which the grounds of the dispute are set out.
The decision also provides for a set of procedures that ensure the completion of the case in a record period of time, by devising proactive solutions prior to filing the lawsuit, as the need for the claimant who files a request requiring the opinion of a technical expert to pay the expert’s fees up to 3% of the amount of the claim and this sum shall not be less than AED 2,000 with the requirement to set the preparation session within 3 days from the date of receiving the report, as well as the possibility to take the expert’s opinion orally during the hearing.
With regard to appeal procedures, the decision allows the appeal of the decisions ending the litigation and which value exceeds the amount of AED 50,000, within 15 days from the date of the judgment, provided that a fixed security amount of AED 1,000 is deposited for each appeal. The said amount is refundable if the appeal is accepted. The court shall determine the appeal in chambers within 5 working days at the latest as of the date of registration. In all cases, the decisions rendered on the appeal shall be final and cannot be challenged by any means of appeal.
