Ancillary relief proceedings - part 3 - FDR

The second of the three most likely court hearings in respect of an ancillary relief application is the Financial Dispute Resolution (“FDR”).

  1. The FDR appointment must be treated as a meeting held for the purpose of discussion and negotiation.
  2. Both parties must personally attend the FDR unless the court orders otherwise.
  3. The Judge or District Judge hearing the FDR appointment must have no further involvement in the case, other than to conduct any further FDR appointment or to make a consent order if agreement is reached, or to make a further directions order.
  4. Not later than 7 days before the FDR appointment, the Applicant for ancillary relief must file with the Court details of all offers, proposals and the responses to these.
  5. This includes any offers, proposals or responses that are made wholly or partly “without prejudice” (that is, usually privileged from disclosure to the Court).
  6. At the conclusion of the FDR appointment, any documents filed with the Court under point 4 above and any filed documents referring to them must be returned to the party filing them at his/her request and not retained on the Court file.
  7. Parties attending the FDR appointment must use their best endeavours to reach agreement on the matters in issue between them.
  8. The FDR appointment may be adjourned from time to time.
  9. At the conclusion of the FDR appointment, the Court may make an appropriate Consent Order (if the parties have agreed terms of settlement) but must otherwise give directions for the future course of proceedings, including, where appropriate, the filing of evidence and fixing a final hearing date.

Experience has been that few cases settle at an FDR appointment.  There are a number of reasons for this including:-

  • The fact that some cases simply seem incapable of being settled by agreement.  They require judicial determination;
  • In other cases the observations made by the Judge or District Judge with regard to the bases for settlement of a case do not find favour with one, other or even both of the parties;
  • Some parties, quite understandably, want more time to consider decisions that, once made, could have profound repercussions for their futures.

It is, however, important to remember that no guillotine falls with regard to negotiations between the parties following the FDR appointment.  The parties can continue to negotiate up to the time of their Final Hearing, if indeed there is one.

For further information regarding matters arising from this article, please telephone Christian Abletshauser on
01932 852057, or email him: ChristianAbletshauser@meadowsfraser.com