In our previous blog post on Process Serving, we looked at the qualities that make a good process server. When dealing with legal proceedings a sense of urgency, a professional approach, and good information are critical to ensuring the legal process moves forward promptly. What that blog did not cover was the amount of work behind the scene that process servers do to make sure their clients’ files are handled on time in a prompt manner.
The people process servers encounter usually fall into one of two groups; those that will accept service and those who avoid it. The group that will accept service are generally the easier of the two, some will even make arrangements to meet the process server to receive the documents. The other group is much more difficult to serve as they actively avoid the process server. When confronted with the task of serving someone who does not want to be served is the stage where the process server must do additional work to get the files served.
When a process server is faced with someone actively avoiding them the server must conduct further research into the person they are tasked with serving. The rise of the internet and social media has helped process servers locate people with greater ease, but it requires searching many Facebook and Twitter profiles to make sure they have found the correct individual. Using skip tracing skills and combining them with the readily available information floating in cyberspace helps in locating the individual, but it does not get the document in their hands which is why it often takes multiple attempts to serve them.
The most challenging aspect of process serving is that it can take multiple attempts of service at the same address to actually get the individual served. Most people work during the day so the process server will often attempt to serve the individual either in the early evening or on the weekend. It can take going to the same address several times to get the documents in the individual’s hands. Also depending on where the person is located can mean driving many kilometers to the individual’s home only for them to not be there. Process serving can be a very repetitive task.
Process servers are an integral part of the legal process, it also is a task that requires a strong work ethic and perseverance as there is plenty of extra work involved sometimes. Conducting research on social media to supplement information provided by their clients and making several attempts of service are traits that reflect the thoroughness and persistence of a seasoned process server. In process serving doing that extra bit of legwork and attention to detail behind the scenes gets the job done.