Jury Service

[doggiescats]

My niece has been called for Jury Service. She is a single Mum with a 2 year old and niece is at Uni studying for MA …a truly brilliant Mum and role model to her toddler.
She genuinely cannot do Jury service because the dates interfere with her placement and holiday time means that daughter not at nursery!!
She sent a letter to Jury service a few weeks ago explaining her dilemma and has now received late this evening a letter saying she she is expected to attend !
Any advice will be wonderful.Xx

I am sure you can defer. Sounds like she has a good enough reason.

www.gov.uk/jury-service/delaying-or-being-excused-from-jury-service

Defer. DH did for work reasons, was absolutely fine.

I’m surprised they said no to a deferral. My friend got called last year for jury service a month into starting her masters.

She asked to defer until the end of her course and they said yes. And that was without the added childcare issues that your friend has! Can she ask again?

Has she already deferred once?

Thank you . I genuinely think that they cannot enforce the service. She has so many mitigating reasons why she is not able to attend! Ironically she really wants to do jury service under normal circumstances because as a SW student it really interests her .
Thank you for your opinions.X

Bizarre - I was excused because of childcare reasons a few years ago.

I actually really wanted to do it but it just wasn’t feasible.

I’m surprised they didn’t let her defer.

I was told I had to do it despite being a single parent, having 3 children under 10 and living 25 miles from the court, which meant that with school drop-offs and pick ups would be extremely difficult. I also needed to book time off work.

In practice I was given a number and had to ring the court before 3pm each day to see if I'd been allocated to a sitting. They over book jurors to make sure there is a decent pool available. I was not called up once in the two weeks so never needed to take time off, although my employer was aware that I might have to at short notice.

Now my children are much older I'd love to be called up again.

asking to be excused and asking to defer are two different things. If she has asked to be excused on the grounds of childcare and placement they will not accept those reasons. If she asks to defer based on those grounds, she will be ok. I deferred mine as I was breastfeeding and my DC wasn’t in nursery as it was at the start of covid. I had to do it a year later 7 months pregnant and reclaimed the costs of my elder DC’s childcare.

You need to get the university department to write a letter of support, with the placement dates, etc. My team do them all the time, and we’re not aware of any ever being disregarded.

I deferred when I was on maternity leave and breastfeeding, with another child with no childcare as I didn't need it.
They called me up again one week after I'd returned to work and wouldn't let me defer again. I felt dreadful being back at work for a week, then having to be off again but obv had the paperwork to prove it wasn't me skiving.
I did a week and it was so boring - two short minor cases, rest of the time spent reading in the waiting area.
She should be ok to defer, but expect to be called again within a year.
My mum is 74 and has never been called, strange isn't it?

I’ve been called to attend in a month’s time. I thought about deferring as the timing is inconvenient from a work POV and will cause disruption with school drop off etc, plus the second week is in half term, and I’m also studying part time for an MBA. But I didn’t think they would excuse me completely and I couldn’t face having an even more difficultly timed summons. I work in the public sector and even our director has done jury service so no getting out of it from a work POV. It does seem fairly bonkers though.

It isn't clear wether she asked be excused or deferred.

Also has she deferred before?

I don't know anyone who has been called for jury duty, not that it affects your nieces problem, just a random observation.

She needs to ask to defer officially.

I was called about a month ago to serve in July.

I’ve got a 3 month old baby which I’m breastfeeding and I’ve got a 2 year old. I requested to defer based on these grounds and it was accepted

I was disappointed to be called now as I’ve actually always wanted to do it!

I had read online that they don’t excuse for childcare, only let you defer so I wonder which she requested

That was meant to say to serve in may! Not July

I got called 12 years ago and asked to defer. They said I'd have to do it within 12 months of the deferral but in all these years have never been called back!

I had defer due to having a holiday booked. I had to give a list of other dates I would not be able to attend during the next 12 months and it was clear that I’d get called up outside of these dates and I wouldn’t be able to defer again, which is what happened. Deferring is easy to get but it only kicks the issue down the road if her circumstances aren’t going to change in next 12 months

as Mentioned above I did jury service few years ago pre child and just been thinking and I honestly don’t think I could manage it now, it would be a nightmare to be called. My son has asd so maybe I’d be exempt as a full time carer but not sure if I would be classed as full time carer as I also work as he’s at school. The other things that caused issues from my experience were

• they’d only reimburse public transport if you lived somewhere where you could get public transport. Good idea in theory but practically it wasn’t. I work in a different area to the court so days I wasnt needed in court this meant I’d have to get the bus home which took at least 45 mins if I got bus straight away but they only run half hourly so usually over an hour. Would then drive 45 mins to work from home. Could have driven 45 mins from court to work but court won’t reimburse parking only public transport which costs just as much unless you live somewhere where you can’t get public transport.
• unless you work in public sector you most likely won’t get paid by work, you can claim from court but it’s capped at £64.95 a day so if you earn more than this you lose out.
• live just looked at childcare and it’s capped at £2.50 an hour up to max of 8 hours a day, good luck with finding that. It’s also not clear if the £64.95 max includes childcare costs so salary reimburse may be lower if you also claim childcare.

I found the court clerk really patronising and thinking back I should have complained. I put in evidence of loss of earnings which was the max as I earnt more and it was almost like she was doing me some sort of massive favour, I remember her saying “I don’t know if the court will pay this”, they did and I was entitled to it but it was the attitude like I was doing something wrong when I was actually out of pocket overall.

it is definitely one of those things when working in the public sector is a big advantage as some of the people I was with worked for the la or nhs and they just got the two weeks off on full pay

My son was called for Jury Service in the middle of his Masters. He asked his university department to write a letter for him (they said this was something they were used to doing) and he was excused.

However They can insist you go it’s a legal summons. No excuses.

Sent you a pm

Penalty is a fine of up to £1k

OP: if your DD asked to be excused, the answer will be "no" (very limited circumstances for that - overlooking an exempt occupation, or serious health issues that make attendance or comprehension impossible) and I'd be surprised if they didn't agree to a deferral in her circumstances