financial disclosure exchange

hello, i am self repping because all my legal aid was used up some time ago trying to get soon to be ex to see his son. his solicitor was pushing for voluntary exchange for today 1/2/12 since before Christmas. I did mine in full, took it to court for stamp and made copies..my sister and itook it to his solicitor and asked if we could check in front of her that all docs were there before exchange and she said no, we exchanged and found loads of docs missing, none from the woman he lives with who he left me for and the document is filled in by this woman and not signed by my husband although the solicitor had written "authorised but not signed for exchange 1/2/12" but she refused to sign it as well or give us a receipt for ours.the court told me that it will not be accepted by the court and that it was not a proper exchange. help please

Hi gonubie2,

You are being taken for a ride, which is not an unusual experience for a LIP when dealing with a sol.

Refuse to answer any questions regarding your own Form E until you have a proper, sworn and complete copy from your stbx.

You could write to the court (I take it they have received your form stating you are self-repping) and explain that the Form E your ex supplied for the voluntary exchange is worthless and that you would like to ask the court to issue directions that your ex provides, full, complete fnancial disclosure, sworn on oath by 1st March (or whatever).

Copy the letter to the court also to your ex's sols with a cover letter (also copied to the court) saying "here's a letter I have written to the court, I find it difficult to reconcile your insistence on voluntary exchange of financial disclosure by 1st Feb 2012 with the unsworn and incomplete information you provided. I have to assume you are either overworked or have some particular scheme in mind. I am a litigant in person and have enough stress to contend with without abuse of my goodwill and am therefore forced to rely on the good offices of the court to ensure that you and/or your practice comply with procedure"

Something like that basically saying "Up yours if you think I'm going to play your games. I'm going by the book and hopefully I'll get costs or you'll get done for contempt"

I hope it goes better from now on!

YA

If anyone else is LIP and heading down this route, what should they have done?

Why would his solicitor have "exchanged" an unsigned unsworn undocumented Form E - was it just intended to take advantage of an LIP and expecting the judge won't do anything?
What can LIPs do about the other party's solicitor behaving badly?

Not sure if this has been updated:
http://www.lawsociety.org.uk/documents/downloads/dynamic/flpp art4.pdf

"4.8.6 Solicitors should advise clients that failure to comply with the
obligation of disclosure is likely to be considered litigation misconduct within the context of the Family Proceedings
(Amendment) (No. 6) Rules 2005, rule 2.71."

"4.11.2 If clients complete Form E, solicitors are still obliged to check
the forms to ensure, as far as is practicable, that the information provided is full, complete and accurate. It is not good practice to exchange Form E with sections incomplete. In the event that the value of an asset cannot be ascertained by the date that a Form E is due to be exchanged, information should be given to the other party’s solicitors as to when the request for the information was made and when a substantive response is likely to be received."

Wow! I love that response, thanks very much...I will get on and do that. Val

If this a voluntary exchange of forms e then I don't think they need to be sworn. There is also no obligation to include all documents. AFAIK this is only compulsory when there has been an application to the courts for financial settlement.

Hadenoughnow

oh I see, thank you very much. Val