Service of documents

Service of district court documents

Service of summons shall primarily be done by post. The letter may arrive either by sign-for-delivery post with an acknowledgement of receipt at the post office or directly at home, in which case the acknowledgement of receipt in the envelope shall be returned to the district court. With the consent of the addressee, service may also be done by electronic means. In this case, the recipient shall be informed that the document can be retrieved from a server designated by the district court.

If it is likely that the service of notices cannot be done by post, the district court process server shall deliver the service to the party concerned. Service in criminal matters is anyhow usually served by a process server. In uncontested debt matters, service of summons may also be done by telephone.

Other documents than those that shall be verifiably served (e.g. statements made by the opposing party, invitations to the preparatory session and main hearing of the dispute, summaries drawn up by the court, etc.) may be sent directly to the postal address or e-mail address indicated by the par-ty.

In addition to court cases, the district court process servers carry out other official service of notice tasks.

Service of documents of administrative courts

A decision or other document of the administrative court is usually served by letter or electronic message. In some cases, the decision or other document shall be served by means of an announce-ment or a general notice published on the website of the court which issued the decision. However, in some categories of matters, the law requires publication on the notice board of the court before the decision is issued.

Documents shall be served verifiably if it concerns a binding decision and the date of service means that the appeal period or another time limit affecting the right of the addressee starts. Documents shall also be served verifiably if it concerns the enforcement of a decision or another provisional order. Service of documents is verifiable if the document is delivered to the addressee, for example by letter against the receipt certificate or by using the service of summons.

The date of service varies according to the means of service. More detailed information on the cal-culation of the date of service can be found in the appeal notices of decisions of the administrative courts.

Administrative Judicial Procedure Act (finlex.fi) (in Finnish)