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It's a guide to bringing a civil claim in England and Wales, and it's meant to be enjoyed as well as used. It goes through the whole thing in order: working out whether you've really got a claim, keeping the evidence that'll prove it, writing a letter before claim that gets taken seriously, deciding whether an offer is worth taking, and adding up what it'll cost once fees, your own time and the risk of paying the other side are counted. Then it covers the claim itself, from issuing online to defences, counterclaims, the free mediation call and a small claims hearing.
Winning turns out to be about halfway. There's a long chapter on actually getting paid, from bailiffs to freezing a debtor's bank account, and an honest one on losing. Four invented disputes run through it, over a half-finished bathroom, a loan between friends, an unpaid invoice and a fence, and they don't all end the way you'd expect. Checklists and model outlines sit at the back, and the law, fees and figures are as they stood in October 2026.
It's a guide to bringing a civil claim in England and Wales, and it's meant to be enjoyed as well as used. It goes through the whole thing in order: working out whether you've really got a claim, keeping the evidence that'll prove it, writing a letter before claim that gets taken seriously, deciding whether an offer is worth taking, and adding up what it'll cost once fees, your own time and the risk of paying the other side are counted. Then it covers the claim itself, from issuing online to defences, counterclaims, the free mediation call and a small claims hearing.
Winning turns out to be about halfway. There's a long chapter on actually getting paid, from bailiffs to freezing a debtor's bank account, and an honest one on losing. Four invented disputes run through it, over a half-finished bathroom, a loan between friends, an unpaid invoice and a fence, and they don't all end the way you'd expect. Checklists and model outlines sit at the back, and the law, fees and figures are as they stood in October 2026.