Court Order

[Kitty876]

A solicitor holds money, which was once joint money between my ex husband and myself.
I have a court order from the family court, that orders the solicitor to pay me the money.

The order is as follows

It is ordered that - Xxx solicitors can release the sum of £x to the Wife

The order is that simple

I have sent the solicitors emails – I know they are receiving the email, but they will not respond and so I do not receive the money.
What can I do ?
I am back in the family court in a few months time in front of the same judge that made the order, but in relation to different matters – I cannot see what the family court can do

The alternative is I take them to small claims court

• all I will end up with another court order that they will ignore. They are in contempt of court by not following the court order.

What am I to do ?

You can report them to the SRA, here is some information:
www.sra.org.uk/consumers/problems/report-solicitor

Is there anything else in the order that makes release of funds conditional and thus there might be a dispute as to whether they should release them?

I'm not sure contempt of court would apply for failure to comply with this court order because the language appears permissive- can, rather than mandatory- must/shall/will.

Might be worth threatening an application to the court to vary order to compel them to comply (probably not a contempt application because I doubt Solicitors were served personally and no penal notice). You could then apply to the court to vary the wording to make release of funds mandatory and the order the have a penal notice. I think it is likely they'd pay up if you threatened that and said you'll ask the court to order they pay the costs of the application.

There was a first court order which had conditions attached.
Many months ago I met the conditions, presented the relevant documents to the solicitor and asked the solicitors to pay me the money.
They had been informed that my ex-husband had started further legal proceeding against me and so would not pay out, because of a pending court hearing

I went to court, the judge said I had met all the conditions and so prepared the second order, without any conditions attached. The first order – had what I think is called a penal notice and a liberty to apply

1. On the first order there was the following
   Warning : If you do not comply with this order, you may be held to be in contempt of court and you may be sent to prison, be fined or have your assets seized.

2. And the liberty to apply was
   The parties shall have liberty to apply to the court concerning the implementation and timing of the terms of this order.

No warning or liberty to apply are attached to the second order

Thank you for your suggestion but that could take a long time, I have been looking at this today, and maybe I just apply for a CCJ against the solicitors, on the basis that there was the warning on the first court order, and I did make a formal request to be paid on the original order.

If I go down this route, I am unsure if I should apply to the county court or high court for a CCJ – do you know the difference
Applying for a CCJ will focus the solicitors minds

The order presumably is between you and the ex and Solicitors are not a party to the proceedings, merely mentioned. I'm not sure you could join them as a party in this type of proceedings.

I would try a ccj at the stage.

Try a final warning letter then consider applying to the court as I mentioned above.

Sorry I would Not try a ccj