International service of process consist of "Notifying" a person in a foreign jurisdiction of a Judicial event in another.

The notification or acknowledgement can be made by many ways and manners which we can classify in direct and indirect.

a. Direct Service of Process: Which is "Private Personal Service",  a person is sub delegated to the "Judicial Authority" to accomplish the "Notification" of the foreign procedure. This "extended "Jurisdictional act" must respect the laws of the foreign and local jurisdictions. A legal frame is proposed by the Hague Convention, but is to the "Judge" to decide if the act of notification is "acceptable" or offers the necessary legal guarantees.

b. Indirect Service of Process: In this manner of service the guarantees are reduced and its main characteristic is the presence of a "Chain of persons" involved in the procedure, in general "Anonymous" or "Impersonal".

Countries that have signed the Hague Convention of 1965, often accept both methods and some have "opposed expressly" to the indirect service of process because of the lack of legal guarantees during that procedure. Service in Countries that are outside the Hague convention must be exam under the perspective of "International Reciprocity" for service of process.

Service by Mail, Fax or Internet will be accepted  by a "Judging Court" if it offers the necessary legal guarantees as will be accepted in the country of future "enforcement of judgment". The Hague Convention Article 10 applicability shows which countries will enforce automatically a "Foreign Judgment ipso iure" serve this way.  A more difficult task is to enforce a judgment in country that is not part of the convention or have not accepted these channels, in this case "reciprocity" and "acceptability" are essential,  in other words  "Legal guarantees of a fair procedure" reason why is recommended to obtain from the judging court a "Special Process Server mandate".

Service by mail, fax or Internet have the following problems:

a. It is an "Anonymous" delivery: The "delivery" is to anyone who receives the mail, fax or email.

b. "Insecure" Contents: The contents of the documents can be "doubted" because of glitches, bad transmission or simply because "blanc pages" arrived to the other side and thereto the "information" was not transmitted properly.

c. "Procedural glitches": The return receipt of reception, if it arrives back, is not an "Affidavit of Service" and if it were to be considered as such, was it "Signed by a person that is liable in front of the Judging court, identified properly and will this Judging court will be able to prosecute this person for an eventual false testimony.

d. Cultural: Language barriers, Postal or Fax Systems, lack of efficiency ...

Anyways these disadvantages can be easily solved and a more solid service can be achieved if a qualified third party, liable in front of the "Judging Court and the enforcement Court "Certifies and Verifies the delivery and contents of service" by an "Affidavit of Service". This "Certifier" must be a national of the "Judging Jurisdiction" and must also be submitted to the laws of the "enforcing jurisdiction".

We are an International Private law firm, composed of U.S. and Canadian citizens, specialized in the application of Article 10 of the Hague Convention of 1965 for service of Process in Civil and Commercial matters and the alternative channels to the use of the Central Authority and service by "reciprocity" in other countries: We offer the maximum guarantees.

We provide international service of process by mail or facsimile (Fax) in Europe and guarantee to the "Judging court" as well as to the "Enforcing court" that service is "acceptable" meaning that was "properly notified". No translation nor apostilles are necessary and the affidavit of service, in English language, is authenticated by the consular authorities and signed by a qualified person. This Affidavit of Service certifies the contents of documents, number of pages and delivery, indicating time and names, with supporting legal documents and complementary information obtained by direct contact with the "receiver". We transform an indirect notification to a direct and reliable notification.

Thank you

Joseph A. de LA CUETARA
Attorney at law

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