Duval & Palm Beach Counties 

So, there are  3 ways Private Process Servers can serve civil process in FL:

• Certified by courts in circuit they serve in
• Appointed by Sheriff in the county they serve in
• Approved by Motion & Order from the Judge presiding over case

Duval is located in the 4th Judicial Circuit of Florida, along with Clay and Nassau. Duval is a Sheriff appointed county. Nassau and Clay are Motion & Order, which means they do not have a private process server program in place either with the Courts or Sheriff.

For many years, the Duval Sheriff would outsource their civil process to a private process serving company. In 2016, the Duval Sheriff changed their policies in regards to private process servers.  They stopped sending their papers to private process servers to serve and started serving everything in house with their own Process Servers or Deputies.

No worries there, it is my understanding that this was the only county where that was the procedure. Where the worry does come in is that also at that time, the Sheriff stopped appointing NEW process servers. They have renewed process server licenses but have not appointed any new servers.

You can surmise that the total number of private process servers has steadily decreased in Duval County over the years. Servers retire, move away and attrition is natural everywhere, so unless the Duval Sheriff changes their policies again, as the years go on, the total number of servers will decline.

While our Jacksonville office has several servers, feel free to file a Motion & Order when filing your case. A benefit of filing a M&O for Duval, although it is not needed, is it will increase the number of servers we have available but are not appointed by Sheriff. Another benefit of filing a M&O when serving in Duval is let’s say we have a Defendant who works in Jacksonville but lives in Fernandina Beach, Nassau County. Subject could evade at POE and to serve at residence, we would need the M&O, so we would be ahead of the game at this point. We will attach a copy of our M&O at the bottom of this Newsletter as well as a list of counties that are M&O, so you know before filing your case.

Moving from Duval to Palm Beach County, which is located in the 15th Judicial Circuit of Florida. Palm Beach County is a certified circuit and very recently they stopped certifying new process servers. Similar to Duval, they will renew licenses of current process servers but will not certify new ones at the moment.

Luckily for us and our clients, Owner/Operator of our Plantation, West Palm Beach, Miami and Key West offices, Josh Wright, has his Palm Beach certification and will continue to renew it over the years and he also has several servers with current licenses as well.

While the Palm Beach development is rather new, the Duval issue has been going on for a few years. It is our hopes that these matters will work out and we know that our state association, FAPPS, and it’s membership will work with lawmakers, sheriffs, court systems, etc. to ensure that private process servers will be available and able to serve all non-enforceable civil process.

Warmest regards,
Beau Charlet

Skip Tracing for Process Serving

While preparing for trial, or deposition, or just finding a new address to facilitate service of process, one of the most handy and cost effective tools can be the skip trace. The better information we have about a subject the better service we can provide.

One time I was serving a summons on a woman at her home. Before I got up to the door I pulled up her Facebook page to remind myself what she looked like. As she answered the door I knew it was her, I said ” Good afternoon Jane, I have a summons and complaint here for you and you have 20 days to respond, have a great day”. As I was handing the docs to her she backed away and said “I’m not Jane, I don’t know what you are talking about”. I then pulled out my phone and showed her pics of herself and her friends having margaritas…. “Jane, I think this is you, here is your summons”. I was about to drop the summons at her feet when she sheepishly reached out and took it from me. Then her mumbles under her breath turned into unmistakable curse-words as I walked back to my vehicle.

The information that exists about people freely on the internet is vast, and valuable even if it was a free search I did on Facebook.

When we have exhausted the known addresses while attempting to affect service we can turn to using a skip trace to try and determine new possible addresses, and what the facts are in our investigation. From time to time we go to the correct address, and we make a note of the vehicles, and ask the people who answer the door what their names are, and people are quite possibly lying about who they are and what they know.

When you run a skip trace you can cut through all that and get right to the point by dealing with facts.

When we take down tag #’s during the service attempts we can run the plates for a small fee to see whose car is parked outside. This can be helpful when the person at the door is claiming no knowledge of the subject, even though their car is parked outside.

When we need more information on a person, we run a skip trace. With this we can see every address our subject has ever lived, and or had a bill sent to. Every phone number, landline or mobile phone number that might be associated with the individual. A skip trace reports also contains Voter registrations, professional licences, real estate holdings, liens, judgments, bankruptcies, alias’, known relatives and associates, current and past vehicle information, UCC filings, hunting permits, weapons permits, and more….

The criminal records may not be the most accurate part, but it will list every time our subject has been arrested, and what happened after that is in the docket.

My clients have used these skip traces in preparation for depositions. In one case the woman being deposed had a history of committing a certain type of fraud. My client was able to use the skip trace information in the deposition to get her on the record regarding facts of the case.

If you would like to look into a skip trace for one of your open jobs, or an upcoming job with Accurate Serve reach out to one of our many offices around the state.
Best Regards,

– Brennan Fogarty

Need our help?
Call (941) 586-7897 or
Email  serve@accurateservesarasota.com

December 2019 Job Count – 4, 189

Average Number of Days from Receiving Paper to Paper Being Served* – 5.18

*This includes jobs that may be on hold or waiting for new info.  There is no way to take those jobs out of the calculation.  So, if a job is placed on hold for 2 weeks, that’s 14 days on that job which factors in to this average. So, we’re even better than what the eyes see, LOL. Some papers get served same day, some next day and some take multiple attempts/addresses to effect service. All we do all day and every day is serve papers. We’re good at it and we love what we do. Thank you for allowing us the opportunity to continue to serve your papers.

Warmest regards,
Beau Charlet

Greetings to everyone who has the pleasure of reading our monthly newsletter. Happy holidays! Happy New Year!

Accurate Serve Plantation is moving into our 5th year since we first opened doors for business. We know this will be a major milestone for our office and just being a small business in general. We couldn’t have done so well without our loyal clients and other franchisees we have the opportunity to work alongside.

If you don’t celebrate a specific holiday, we all have something special and close to our hearts. Whether it’s spending time with loved ones, traveling to places you have never seen before or just giving yourself that extra love and attention, we all have something in our lives to celebrate at this time of year and to look forward to moving into the New Year.

If there is anything your office may need, give us a call or email and we would be happy to assist you. From everyone here at Accurate Serve Plantation, we want to say THANK YOU!

Best Regards,

-Joshua Wright

Need our help?
Call (954) 770-9997 or
Email josh@accurateserveplantation.com

November 2019 Job Count – 4, 372

Average Number of Days from Receiving Paper to Paper Being Served* – 5.14

*This includes jobs that may be on hold or waiting for new info.  There is no way to take those jobs out of the calculation.  So, if a job is placed on hold for 2 weeks, that’s 14 days on that job which factors in to this average. So, we’re even better than what the eyes see, LOL. Some papers get served same day, some next day and some take multiple attempts/addresses to effect service. All we do all day and every day is serve papers. We’re good at it and we love what we do. Thank you for allowing us the opportunity to continue to serve your papers.

Computation of Time and an FYI

This month we are going to touch on computation of time. As you can see below, we have referenced Rule 1.090 of Civil Procedure.

Florida Rules of Civil Procedure
RULE 1.090 TIME

(a) Computation. In computing any period of time prescribed or allowed by these rules, by order of court, or by any applicable statute, the day of the act, event, or default from which the designated period of time begins to run shall not be included. The last day of the period so computed shall be included unless it is a Saturday, Sunday, or legal holiday, in which event the period shall run until the end of the next day which is neither a Saturday, Sunday, or legal holiday. When the period of time prescribed or allowed is less than 7 days, intermediate Saturdays, Sundays, and legal holidays shall be excluded in the computation.

The first thing I want to go over in these regards is the trigger date. The day of service is NOT included in the computation. Day 1 is the following day, unless the next day is a weekend or legal holiday. So, if we are serving a Summons that requires a response w/in 20 days and that Summons is served on a Friday, the clock starts the following Monday (unless that Monday is a legal holiday).

Second thing we would like to discuss is the last day of the clock, the expiration date. The last day can not fall on a weekend or legal holiday. So, let’s say we are serving an Eviction Summons that has a 5 day response time. If that Eviction was served on a Monday, the 5th day is a Saturday, so you skip that day, and Sunday, and the 5th day is actually Monday (so the 5 days is really 7).

Finally, what happens with computation of time when you have a week or less?  Well, you can’t count the weekends or legal holidays in the count.  A lot of times we see this come in to play is when serving a designated employee on behalf of a law enforcement officer. See below FL Statutes 48.031(4)(a). As you can see in part 3, it says 5 days but with computation of time, it’s actually 7 days.  So, if serving a criminal witness subpoena on a LEO, you want those served a full 7 days before the court date so we can serve the designated employee with no issue.

(4)(a) Service of a criminal witness subpoena upon a law enforcement officer or upon any federal, state, or municipal employee called to testify in an official capacity in a criminal case may be made as provided in subsection (1) or by delivery to a designated supervisory or administrative employee at the witness’s place of employment if the agency head or highest ranking official at the witness’s place of employment has designated such employee to accept such service. However, no such designated employee is required to accept service:

1. For a witness who is no longer employed by the agency at that place of employment;
2. If the witness is not scheduled to work prior to the date the witness is required to appear; or
3. If the appearance date is less than 5 days from the date of service.

Warmest regards,
Beau Charlet

November is here and the holiday spirit is in the air. Soon we will be full of turkey and either getting prepared for a crazy day of Black Friday shopping or putting up the Christmas decorations. Along with
the holidays comes daylight saving time and the return of our wonderful snowbirds here in Florida – especially in SWFL.

As much as we all love enjoying the long days of summer, the change in time does have some positives for the process serving industry. The latest sunset in Fort Myers for the month of November is 5:37 PM. Meaning when many individuals are just getting home from work, they will already need to flick on the lights just to start cooking dinner. Lights being on is a great way for our servers to identify if someone is home or even see if there has been activity within the home. This also goes for the lights on the outside
of the home. Not everyone uses a timer to keep these lights on and off which can help servers to know if anyone is coming and going from the location. On the flip side to this the sun is also rising between 6:30-6:45 AM throughout the month of November. This naturally has people waking up a little earlier and providing us a little additional time to tag individual at home before going to work.

As snowbirds begin to travel between their homes throughout the holiday, you can rely on our office to get the job done for you at both locations. Sometimes it is unknown if the individual(s) are still up north or if they have made their way south. We can either begin attempts at one of the locations to rule it out or confirm they are there. If time is of the essence and the individual could be a problem serve, we can attempt both locations simultaneously. When attempting simultaneous locations, our servers are made aware
and as usual your office is updated on each attempt. Once one address is ruled out, we will stop efforts there and continue at the other location. Once service is completed you are provided with your return which will show the correct address for service.

If you are interested in our online portal, please remember to reach out for access. Our office will send you a registration email which will allow you to use your email as a username and a password that you create.

The holidays can be a crazy and hectic time just like many lawsuits. When you are in need of a process server, please think of Accurate Serve Fort Myers and contact our office to help bring ease to the process. Stay safe driving and shopping this holiday season, we wish you all full stomachs and happy hearts.

Knock knock knock…. You’ve been served!

– Brandon Muscato

Need our help?
Call (239) 822-7299 or
Email brandon@accurateserveftmyers.com

October 2019 Job Count – 5,325

Average Number of Days from Receiving Paper to Paper Being Served* – 4.9

*This includes jobs that may be on hold or waiting for new info.  There is no way to take those jobs out of the calculation.  So, if a job is placed on hold for 2 weeks, that’s 14 days on that job which factors in to this average. So, we’re even better than what the eyes see, LOL. Some papers get served same day, some next day and some take multiple attempts/addresses to effect service. All we do all day and every day is serve papers. We’re good at it and we love what we do. Thank you for allowing us the opportunity to continue to serve your papers.

Update on E-Signing

We did a Newsletter article in June 2019 about the signing of House Bill 91, and it’s ramifications.  One of those, was the fact that process servers could now e-sign their Returns in lieu of printing the Return, signing it and then scanning.  Once the new law had taken place, our software programmer worked diligently in incorporating an e-sign feature through the App our Servers use to update service jobs.  In the past month, Accurate Serve has e-signed over 2,000 Returns and the time from papers getting served to the time our Clients have received their Returns has drastically increased, which is awesome!!

We are always looking for ways to improve our processes and provide better service to our Clients.  The ideal goal is to receive your paper for service and get it out for service ASAP.  We want 100% of papers served right away and this happens a lot.  But, some papers are trickier than others (Halloween reference).  Just know serving your papers is our top priority.  If you ever have any info that can assist us in getting your papers served quicker, please let us know.  And if you ever need anything from us, we are here for you, just please reach out and let us know what we can do for you.

Warmest regards,
Beau Charlet

Accurate Serve® of Tallahassee is proud to partner with the people at PAF. October is going to be a great month for that relationship. October 23rd is National Paralegal Day! We are happy to announce that the Tallahassee chapter of PAF will be honored with an official Proclamation for Paralegal Day. The Mayor of Tallahassee, John Dailey will take part in a ceremony here in Tallahassee to honor the local paralegals integrity, professionalism, among many other contributions to the legal community.

Please take a look at the proclamation below! If you are a client of ours in the Tallahassee area, we will see you there!

– Brennan Fogarty

Need our help?
Call 850-519-5494 or
Email brennan.fogarty@accurateservetally.com

June 2019 Job Count – 4,557

Average Number of Days from Receiving Paper to Paper Being Served* – 4.29

*This includes jobs that may be on hold or waiting for new info.  There is no way to take those jobs out of the calculation.  So, if a job is placed on hold for 2 weeks, that’s 14 days on that job which factors in to this average. So, we’re even better than what the eyes see, LOL. Some papers get served same day, some next day and some take multiple attempts/addresses to effect service. All we do all day and every day is serve papers. We’re good at it and we love what we do. Thank you for allowing us the opportunity to continue to serve your papers.

Back to School Special

All over the country, boys and girls of all ages are returning to the classrooms to broaden their minds and increase their knowledge bases. Below are a few categories of those ages and how it can affect or relate to service of process.

K – 8: What I want to touch on here is routines. If you are a parent, you generally wake up at the same time to get kids ready for school and out the door. So, most households are active early AM, this is a great time for residential serve attempts. Also, buses are everywhere. We stress to our Servers to always drive safe on the road and mind all traffic rules, stopping for buses, slowing down in school zones, etc.

9 – 12: This is the time kids start driving or catching rides to school from older friends or family members. If you are a parent in this age group, please stress to your child, or their driver, to always drive safe on the road and mind all traffic rules, stopping for buses, slowing down in school zones, etc. And NO texting and driving. It’s a real issue and it affects all of us.

College Age: Sometimes college kids return home to their families for the summer. Now, school is back in session, so if they were visiting home, they are back to school now.

Professionals: Professionals never stop learning. Industries change and you need to adapt. By continuing to educate yourself in your field, you can provide better service to your Clients. Our state association (FAPPS = FL Assoc of Professional Process Servers) holds a continuing education class each year and after attending the course and scoring a high enough grade, process servers can earn the AFPS designation. AFPS = Accredited FAPPS Process Server. I am proud to say that right now, 17% of the AFPS registry, are current Accurate Serve® Owners/Operators.

Warmest regards,
Beau Charlet

When we say everywhere… we mean EVERYWHERE!

If you need service of process in the Jacksonville area, feel free to send the docs along to our office! After we review the docs, we will give you a quote and get your documents out for service! With our team of in-house servers, we provide coverage for the Accurate Serve affiliates from the southern edge of St. Johns County to the Florida/Georgia border.

What if you need service elsewhere; in another state? Miami? Chicago? New York? The answer is the same! Feel free to send the docs- we will give you a quote and get to work!

We have been cultivating and contracting our service of process connections for the last 7 years to develop a nationwide network. If you can find it on a map, we can get somebody there!

What if the person we are looking for has fled the country? The answer is the same! Send along the docs, we can get you a quote and get right to work! When it comes to international service, your docs may need to go through the International Court of Justice at the Hague Convention. We will be able to help you along with this process, too.

No need to ask us for referrals, we are set up so that we can handle all of your service of process needs and facilitate service regardless of wherever it may need to go!

If you have multiple services going to various locations around the country, all you need to do is send the docs over and we can get them served for you. By using your local Accurate Serve for all your service of process needs, we can better serve you. Most importantly, you can spend your time on something that requires your expertise.

When it comes to service of process, leave it to the professionals at Accurate Serve®.

– Brennan Fogarty

Need our help?
Call (904) 735-7810 or
Email serve@accurateservejax.com

June 2019 Job Count – 4,826

Average Number of Days from Receiving Paper to Paper Being Served* – 4.92

*This includes jobs that may be on hold or waiting for new info.  There is no way to take those jobs out of the calculation.  So, if a job is placed on hold for 2 weeks, that’s 14 days on that job which factors in to this average. So, we’re even better than what the eyes see, LOL. Some papers get served same day, some next day and some take multiple attempts/addresses to effect service. All we do all day and every day is serve papers. We’re good at it and we love what we do. Thank you for allowing us the opportunity to continue to serve your papers.