being excused jury service

[HaggisPakora]

At the age of almost 52 have been cited for jury service for the first time ever. I don't in principle object to doing it, but the week they have asked for is the one week we have a holiday booked!! I can prove this booking and have sent off the email confirmation to the court.

I am assuming the fact I was planning to be in the US that week will be enough grounds to cancel? And will they just shove it back a bit so I can expect another citation soon?

If you already have a holiday booked you should be exempt.
https://www.scotcourts.gov.uk/coming-to-court/jurors/excusal-from-jury-service
I know people who were called again soon after an exemption, so you might get another citation.
Lots of people who get a citation don’t end up having to do anything.

I’d expect you will be excused if you can prove your booking, they might just bump it along and cite you to attend another time.

My jury service overlapped with a planned holiday and I was excused

You will be excused but may be called again. Hope you have a lovely holiday.

Excusal process very quick - just emailed a pdf of my booking and i've been excused. will see if they call me again.

I was excused due to having a booked holiday, I was then called two times within a year following that but never been "picked", they have told me I will keep getting called until I do get picked! It is a pest having to do the old "phone and find out" every night for a week.

Honestly @StrictlyPrue I could really do without it. I am self-employed and their "loss of earnings" is capped at £65 a day. For many employed people, their employer tops that up, I do not have anyone to do that. So get called for jury service, sit on your arse for 8 hours for £65, then come home and have to work all evening on the work you should have been doing that day, as you can't let clients down. No ability to schedule your service for a time you know your business is quiet (August or December for me).

And they can keep you there for MONTHS, by which time you haven't got a business to return to.

I was excused last July as we were on holiday, but I’ve been cited to do it in February.

If you’re self employed you can ask to do it at a quiet time of year I think (well I know people in England who requested January as they had a lull in work then).

I've been excused twice but was told the second time they would keep sending me citations! This time I accepted but didn't have to go, which makes me wonder if I'll be called again soon. It's a total pain.

My husband owns a business that could not run without him. When he was called he asked to be excused and was refused in the first instance. He then had to submit an appeal to the judge stating why the business would suffer etc and was excused. It was quite a long and stressful process.

I was called up for jury service and had a holiday booked. I sent evidence of flights over etc. You can defer once, but they will call you back up again at a later date.

Ds was cited twice in Glasgow while he was up at Aberdeen Uni and had to send evidence that he was a student to be excused. (On the electoral register, which is used to pick jurors, legitimately in both places).

Since he moved back down (18 months ago) he's been cited twice but his boss has written a letter saying that with a small organisation and other people already on holiday, it would have a detrimental effect on the business and that's been accepted. I suspect that next time he won't be able to defer - unless he actually has a holiday booked and paid for himself

I would expect you'd be called up again soon after. I was called even after serving on a jury within less than 2 years, but excused myself as it's a massive hassle with little kids.
From what I've been told it's unlikely to be more than 1 week and mostly 2-3 days. It's the unpredictable nature of it that's such a huge pain. I was even considering taking myself off the electoral register...

@Callisto1 - you should have been excused as of right, as you are exempt for 5 years after having been selected by ballot to serve on a jury (and 2 years if you're cited but not selected by ballot)

From the Scottish Courts website https://www.scotcourts.gov.uk/docs/default-source/coming-to-court/jurors/1-guide-to-jury-service-eligibility.pdf?sfvrsn=2

Thanks @prettybird. I did get excused without much hassle due to the 5 year rule. It seems that the courts are very busy though since both DH and me got called and I know a lot of our friends did too. To be fair it's probably easier to get it over with rather than get continuously summoned just to be told no.

I've served 3 times since I was 33 (am 62 now) and been called 3 other times (twice for the High Court for fortunately after a week of calling, being discharged )

Dh is the same with the number of times served and called - although he did have to do a 3 week rape case at the High Court

It's almost as if once they know you'll turn up, you're put on a list of "reliable potential jurors"

I did manage to get out of serving once when we'd moved house (so looked like "new" jurors), when they used to send out "pre-jury-service" letters which asked for availability for that whole year) by saying that I'd served 4.5 years before so was exempt for 6 months and that afterwards, as I was breastfeeding, would need somewhere to express and then store the EBM ....never heard any more from them that year

It was 2 or 3 years before they called me again

I was actually wondering about this recently as Dd is autistic and now over 18.
She wouldn’t be able to do it, she finds communicating and social situations overwhelming but not sure how she would be able to be excused ?

She Would probably ignore the letter and she finds it difficult to talk to strange people.
Not sure if they would accept me telling them she can’t do it. I do have documentation as I am her legal appointee for social security.

DS is autistic and was called twice, while he was a student, at exam time, when travel restrictions were on but required him to attend in dunfermline and not Stirling. He was excused both times. It was a blessing as he has similar issues to your daughter and us now diagnosed autistic.

If he gets called again, I'd be looking to get him a permanent excusal. Apart from the anxiety and inability to communicate, there is also the point that whilst he us very astute, he struggles to make decisions and would probably just say he didn't know whether the person was guilty or not. Especially as he wasn't there...

I would think they would accept your daughters diagnosis.

I was called recently and whilst it was all a bit of a faff (I was picked to serve but the entire jury had to be released and repicked), I quite enjoyed it and would happily do it again.

Having read the letter, if you are unable to attend because of a medical issue whether temporary or permanent, you'd need a letter from your doctor. You would hope though that in the case of someone whose issues are not going to get better over time would be struck off the list permanently.

I'm not saying I'm not happy to do it - I think it's an important part of the justice system. It would be good though if they could say something like "you have been picked to serve in 2024" and at that point you log onto a system and highlight maybe 6 or 8 preferred weeks to serve.

I agree OP and I think that will be the case. Just to note that the letters are no longer signed for so technically you could completely ignore and fail to engage and claim to have not received them.

I think this is why people who have engaged end up being recalled multiple times.

The system isn't great but I guess if they only had people serve who wanted to and had free time on their hands then that wouldn't be representative of the general population.

Maybe some sort of rolling program where you serve every 5 years unless permanently excused but like you say, you are able to suggest times that are better for your availability.

I think more people would be willing to do jury service if they actually covered the costs of attending.
In our case we didn't have nursery for the week, but they couldn't tell me how long it will last. While I can ask a friend to pick up a child from school at short notice it's impossible to get childcare for a toddler at short notice. And it's also expensive to book in a week if you'll only end up using a day or two, the costs of which are capped and only repayed if you actually serve on the day.
I think there's similar issues for the self employed.

I agree @Callisto1 there has to be a better way of doing! Even for big business who cover the cost of employees attending it's disruptive as people don't know if they're going to be working or not for potentially the next few weeks. It means workloads have to be handed over or deadlines delayed, and then they find they're not needed so it all has to be reshuffled again. IME there's also a hell of a lot of time wasted hanging around waiting for things to happen, it's no wonder lawyers charge by the minute!

Yes Callisto I will be very out of pocket by doing it.

Shouldn't have posted on this thread: dh had just received a citation ! Fortunately for the Sheriff Court but the citation says that one of the cases slated to take place that week will last at least 7 days

Assuming he's picked That will make it the 4th or 5th time he will have actually served (once for 3 weeks at the High Court) and about the 8th time he's been called (he's lost count! )

He's 65 next birthday so hopefully this will be the last time

It's not Dumbarton is it @prettybird or I'll be left wondering if he was next on the list after I got excused...