Small Claims Standards: Foreword

The Administrative Office of the Trial Court issues these Standards to assist judges, clerk-magistrates and other personnel of the District Court, Boston Municipal Court, and Housing Court Departments in implementing recently amended Trial Court Rule III, Uniform Small Claims Rules (effective January 1, 2002).

The long delayed amendments to the Uniform Small Claims Rules were necessitated by amendments to G.L. c. 218, §§ 21-25, especially those authorizing clerk-magistrates to hear and decide small claims in the first instance, and by appellate decisions effecting procedural changes in small claims actions. 

The goal of the Standards is two fold:

1. To expedite, consistent with applicable statutory and decisional law and court rules, the fair and efficient disposition of small claims in all Trial Court departments having jurisdiction of such actions; and
2. To promote confidence among litigants that their small claims will be processed expeditiously and impartially by the courts according to applicable rules and statutes and recognized Standards.

The Standards were carefully constructed by the Trial Court Committee on Small Claims Procedures to mesh with the amended Uniform Small Claims Rules and applicable appellate decisions. That Committee brought to its task a wealth of experience and insights gained from a variety of perspectives. In developing the Standards, the Committee also drew heavily upon the District Court Department's earlier Standards of Judicial Practice: Small Claims (1984).

The Standards not only reflect statutory amendments to the small claims process and recent appellate decisions, but they also emphasize those procedural improvements adopted as part of the recently amended Uniform Small Claims Rules. The most significant of these improvements is the provision for automatic payment hearings in place of the former cumbersome, expensive, and often time-consuming process for collecting on small claims judgments. In tests concluded prior to the amendment of the rules, this provision garnered enthusiastic support from judicial personnel as well as from practitioners and representatives of consumer advocacy and legal services programs.

I wish to thank all who have contributed to the adoption of the amended Uniform Small Claims Rules and to these companion Standards. Their contributions are of invaluable assistance to the administration of justice by the Trial Court and to the tens of thousands of litigants who resort annually to the Trial Court for the fair and expeditious resolution of their small claims.

Barbara A. Dortch-Okara
Chief Justice for Administration and Management
November 30, 2001