The recently launched Possession Claims Online system - equipped with direct debit - allows landlords and lenders to repossess over the Web and is another step to e-courts, reports Rupert White

What might be only the second truly successful courts IT project of recent times was rolled out nationally last week. Possession Claims Online (PCOL) is a Web-based method of making claims for possession for bodies such as lenders, councils and social landlords attempting to recover possession of residential property.


The service comes relatively hot on the heels of Money Claims Online (MCOL), a system that is now processing more than 900,000 claims through the courts of England and Wales electronically via a Web interface and an electronic bulk claim system.


But PCOL has, said its makers, a unique new twist - it allows 'customers' to apply for and set up a direct-debit arrangement for the collection of court fees and payment.


The move directly affects the legal representatives of companies and organisations such as private landlords, registered social landlords, lenders, housing associations and the like. The Courts Service told the Gazette that 'unlike MCOL, all [possession] claims do still have to have a hearing even if uncontested. Therefore efficiencies are in the context of initial paperwork, staff resources, automatic scheduling [and so on]'.


But, a spokeswoman said, 'there are also benefits for the end users, particularly larger claimants such as local authorities and mortgage lenders who don't have to make lots of individual claims. For all claimants, the process of the claim actually being issued is more convenient and speedier, as it is all automatic on-line'.


There is also a more abstract future pointed to by MCOL and PCOL - electronic filing of documents to and from court, and IT systems for claiming, filing and identification that law firms and in-house lawyers will no doubt have to take on by the time Whitehall makes e-filing happen, which it has claimed may be in 2009.


But for now there is also the direct debit advantage of PCOL. According to PCOL's project manager Paul Rogers, this is a big step forward because 'direct debit doesn't exist in the Courts Service... at the moment'. With MCOL, said Mr Rogers, individual claims and bulk claims can be and are made electronically 'but [people] are not paying fees by direct debit' - bulk payments are generally made by cheque.


The system was tried out first in Wales at county courts in Aberdare, Bridgend, Neath, Cardiff, Merthyr Tydfil, Pontypridd and Swansea. Swansea County Council's legal department told the Gazette it had yet to make full use of PCOL, but it would do so. 'As Swansea City Council develops its e-gov programme we will in the near future be able to fully utilise the system,' said a council spokesman.


'We have used the system to view case details (these have been entered into court in the traditional manner and then have been entered on the system by court staff). Even this limited use has proved that this initiative is of great benefit.'