Ng Mui Shee, Andy Nelson v Mohamed Rahmat bin Abdul Rahman

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: Lewis Tan
• Judgment Date: 22 June 2021
• Neutral Citation: [2021] SGMC 42
• Court: Magistrates' Court (Singapore)
• Docket Number: Magistrate Court Suit No 6485 of 2020 (Summons No 1683 of 2021)
• Year: 2021
• Published date: 26 June 2021
• Hearing Date: 29 April 2021
• Plaintiff Counsel: Nagarajah S Maniam (S L Law Chambers)
• Defendant Counsel: Tan Chee Kiong (Seah Ong & Partners LLP)
• Subject Matter: Civil Procedure,Limitation,Extension of time to serve writ after limitation period has expired
• Citation: [2021] SGMC 42

Deputy Registrar Lewis Tan:

The Plaintiff and Defendant were involved in a motor vehicle accident on the morning of 18 June 2017. After the accident, correspondence was exchanged between the Plaintiff’s former solicitors and the Defendant’s motor insurers, but parties failed to resolve the matter and the discussions culminated in the insurers rejecting the Plaintiff’s claim in November 2018.

The matter stood unaddressed until 15 June 2020, when the Plaintiff instructed his present solicitors from S L Law Chambers (“S L Law”) to take over the conduct of the matter. Acting promptly, S L Law prepared and issued a Writ of Summons on 17 June 2020, just one day before the expiry of the three-year limitation period.

Unfortunately, the matter then returned to its dormancy until 29 December 2020, when Mr Nagarajah S Maniam (“Mr Nagarajah”), who had just joined S L Law, took over conduct of the file, and realised that the Writ of Summons had not been served on the Defendant. By this time, the Writ of Summons had expired, and more crucially, the limitation period for the Plaintiff’s claim had also lapsed.

Mr Nagarajah then attempted to settle the matter with the Defendant’s insurers, but was stonewalled in the process. Without further recourse, an ex parte application was taken out to renew the Writ of Summons for a further six months, and such application was granted.

The reprieve was however short lived, as the Defendant responded shortly thereafter with an application to set aside the order granting the renewal of the Writ of Summons.

As both the validity of the writ and the limitation period had expired, the parties were in agreement that the burden was on the Plaintiff to demonstrate first, good reason for the renewal of the writ and secondly, a satisfactory explanation for his failure to apply for an extension of time before the expiry of the writ (Kleinwort Benson Ltd v Barbrak Ltd and other appeals [1987] AC 597 (“Kleinwort Benson”) at 623). Unless such good reason and satisfactory explanation could be provided, the renewal of the Writ of Summons would have to be set aside, and the Plaintiff’s claim against the Defendant would be time-barred.

To this, Mr Nagarajah candidly admitted on affidavit that while his firm was aware that the limitation period would expire one day after the Writ of Summons was issued, the Writ of Summons was not served on the Defendant “due to the complication with the [Defendant’s] address and as the staff handling the matter was working from home during the Covid situation”. Moreover, “the previous Solicitor and staff handling the matter had already left [S L Law]”, such that by the time Mr Nagarajah took over conduct of the matter, the validity of the...