Served With a Statement of Claim? Speak With a Defence Lawyer

Served With a Statement of Claim? Speak With a Defence Lawyer.

Spingos Law defends Ontario homeowners in collection lawsuits. A lawyer reviews your documents and explains your options, at no cost and with no obligation.

Deadlines are strict. If you were served in Ontario you generally have 20 days to file a defence. Miss it and the creditor can obtain default judgment, which can lead to wage garnishment or a lien on your home.

Respond to the claim before your deadline passes

Test whether the creditor can actually prove the debt

Defend against default judgment, garnishment and liens

Free consultation· Confidential· Ontario only

Free Case Review

Tell us what you were served with. A member of the legal team responds the same business day.

What happens next

You send the detailsTell us what you were served with. It takes about a minute.

A lawyer reviews itWe read your documents and call you back to explain where you stand.

You get your optionsYour deadline, your possible defences, and what it costs, before you commit to anything.

What a Statement of Claim actually means

A Statement of Claim is the document that starts a lawsuit. Someone, usually a creditor or a collection law firm acting for one, has filed it with an Ontario court and had it served on you. It is an allegation, not a finding. Nothing has been decided against you yet.

What matters most is the clock. Once you have been served in Ontario you generally have 20 days to file a statement of defence. If that window closes without a response, the creditor can ask the court for default judgment. At that point the argument is over before it started, and enforcement begins.

What default judgment lets a creditor do

Garnish your wages, taking a portion of every paycheque directly from your employer
Freeze a bank account and take the funds in it
Register a lien against your home, which surfaces when you sell or refinance
Force the sale of your home. Once a judgment is registered as a writ of seizure and sale, the sheriff can sell your interest in the property. A lien is not only something that surfaces later; it can be enforced.

None of that requires your agreement once judgment is granted. That is why the response window is the part of this process worth acting on immediately.

Being sued is not the same as owing the money

A creditor bringing a claim still has to prove it. In practice several things are worth testing before anyone concedes the amount:

Can they prove the debt is yours? Debts are frequently sold between collection agencies, and the paperwork proving the chain of ownership is often incomplete.
Is the claim brought in time? Ontario's Limitations Act, 2002 sets a basic two-year limitation period. Claims are sometimes filed on debts that are too old to pursue.
Is the amount right? Claimed balances often include interest, fees and charges that need to be examined rather than accepted.
Were you properly served? Service has rules, and defective service matters.

What a defence lawyer does at this stage

The first job is protecting your position: evaluating any possible defence, and establishing contact with the creditor so the deadline passes without a default judgment against you. From there the work depends on what the documents show. Sometimes that means defending the claim on its merits. Sometimes it means disputing the amount. Most commonly it means negotiating a resolution the client can actually afford.

What that looks like in your case depends on facts we have not seen yet. That is what the free review is for: a lawyer reads what you were served with and tells you plainly what your options are, including when the honest answer is that you do not need us.