You must now file with the court certain documentation, comprising the following:
1 A chronology, setting out briefly the history of the matter. An example chronology can be found in Appendix 1. As can be seen, it is a fairly simple document.
2 A concise statement of the apparent issues between yourself and your spouse, i.e. the matters that the court will have to decide. Again, an example statement is included in Appendix 1. Be sure only to include issues that are relevant to the financial/ property settlement, such as those set out in the example. You should get a good idea of the relevant issues by reading your spouse’s Form E, particularly Section 5.1. For example, is there any dispute about the assets of each party? Perhaps you think that the other party has undervalued or even failed to disclose
their assets or income. Is there a dispute as to whether or not one party is cohabiting or intends to cohabit? Is one party claiming that they have contributed more to the marriage than the other party? Then you need to consider what each party is asking for. For example, should there be a clean break? Should there be an unequal division of assets? Should there be a pension sharing order? Do not include issues that are not relevant to the financial/property settlement, for example the reasons for the breakdown of the marriage are rarely relevant – there is nothing more guaranteed to annoy the district judge than wasting their time with irrelevant matters.
3 A questionnaire setting out the further information and documents that you require from your spouse. Again, an example questionnaire can be found in Appendix 1. In particular, you should check whether there are any matters that are not correct in your spouse’s Form E or any matters that they have omitted from the form – if so, these matters should be raised in the questionnaire. Please note, however, that the questionnaire can only contain questions that are relevant to the outcome of the matter, and that the court will consider whether the questions are relevant at the First Appointment (see below). You do not therefore need to reply to the other party’s questionnaire prior to the First Appointment.
4 A Form G – notice of response to First Appointment, on which you must state whether or not you will be in a position to proceed with a Financial Dispute Resolution (FDR) appointment (see below), at the First Appointment. Appendix 1 includes an example Form G. Most often, you will not be in a position to proceed with a FDR at the First Appointment because you will still be requiring further disclosure from the
other party, in particular in reply to your questionnaire. In any event, the matter is often academic because the court will often not have enough time available to proceed with an FDR at the First Appointment.
Once these four documents are ready, you must file them with the court and serve copies upon the other party within the time limit set out by the court.
When you receive copies of your spouse’s documents, you should obviously read them, paying particular attention to their statement of issues and questionnaire. Consider whether any of the issues can be resolved by agreement, thereby reducing the number of matters that the court has to decide. As to their questionnaire, you do not yet have to reply to it, as mentioned above. However, consider whether any of the questions are irrelevant (or have already been answered), in which case you can ask the court to disallow those questions, at the First Appointment.