Los Angeles Superior Court Civil eFiling Meeting – What Was Discussed
The Los Angeles Superior Court will soon begin to implement eFiling in their Civil Division, and so in preparation, they held a public meeting in October 2018 to discuss some of the logistics as well as some of the potential issues for law firms and attorney services to be aware of. Some of the takeaways from the meeting were:
Potential Rejections Reasons
- Incorrect case category
- Incorrect case type
- Incorrect court location
- Incorrect document type
- Incorrect party type
- Incorrect payment account options
- Multiple filing documents are submitted as a single filing code and/or in the same PDF
- Party address does not match address on initial petition
- Party names entered differ from names on document(s)
*Please note that we have been warned that the court expects to have an unusually high number of rejections in the beginning, so please plan accordingly.
Courtesy Copies
Courtesy copies should include a proof of electronic submission. They are required if documents are eFiled within 2 days of the hearing date. They are also required for the following document types:
- Anti-SLAPP filings
- Any printed documents required pursuant to a Standing or General Order
- Demurrers
- Motions to Compel Further Discovery
- Motions for Summary Judgment/Adjudication
- Pleadings and motions of 26 or more pages
*Please note that courtesy copies for filings with a hearing date of two days or less should be delivered to the courtroom by 4:30 p.m. the same business day, if the electronic filing is submitted with the court prior to that time. If submitted after 4:30 p.m., the courtesy copy shall be delivered to the courtroom by 10:00 a.m. the next business day.
Document Requirements
- All PDFs need to be searchable (i.e. OCR)
- Exhibits attached to documents need to be bookmarked
- Internally linking to other relevant sections of your document is encouraged
- Proposed Orders should have both a DOCX version (i.e. Microsoft Word) and a PDF version
Documents Exempt from eFiling
- Bonds/Undertaking documents
- Lodged documents (Notices of Lodging should still be eFiled)
- Peremptory Challenges
- Trial and Hearing Exhibits
Ex Parties
- Appearance required with Proposed Order by the applicant on the day of the Ex Parte
- Ex Parte filings need to be submitted by 10:00am, the day prior to the court date
- Oppositions to Ex Partes that are filed by 4:00pm the day prior to the court date do not need a courtesy copy; if filed after 4:00pm the day before the hearing, a courtesy copy should be brought to courtroom on the day of the Ex Parte hearing
Return Time
The anticipated time for the court to process most eFiled documents will vary from two hours to two days; but they are shooting for an average turnaround time of 24 hours for most documents.
eService
Electronic service of process should be completed through the Electronic Filing Service Provider (EFSP) and not emailed from your own personal account.
Filing Deadlines
To have your papers considered filed on a specific date, be sure that they are submitted by 11:59pm.
LASC Civil eFiling FAQ’s
The court has published a comprehensive list of Frequently Asked Questions on their website and we have provided a link below:
http://www.lacourt.org/division/efiling/pdf/CIVILEFILINGFAQs1-11-19.pdf
Bosco Legal is an authorized EFSP with the Los Angeles Superior Court and can either eFile your documents for you, or provide you a portal for you to eFile on your own. For more information, visit our website at https://www.boscolegal.org/legal-services/e-filing/.
*Please note that the information above is being provided as a reference only, and Bosco Legal Services does not make any guarantees as to the accuracy of the above information. It is anticipated that as things are being implemented within the LASC, there will likely be changes made to some of the procedures that are outlined above.