J udi c i a l
Suc c e s s
E RVE R PROCE S SS S E C R E T S ByMa r i aJ . Gut i er r ez
E s s e na l sT o Be c o meA P r o c e s sS e r v e r
SPECIAL REPORT: The Essentials To Process Serving
TABLE OF CONTENTS • [ PAGE 2 ] How You Can Easily Get Started In the World of Process Serving • [ PAGE 3 ] How To Easily Get Through The Legal And Administrative Requirements of Becoming A Process Server • [ PAGE 5 ] The Legal Documents That You’ll be Handling As A Process Server • [ PAGE 6 ] How To Serve Process In Residences and Corporations • [ PAGE 8 ] Working with Deadlines • [ PAGE 9 ] Why It’s Actually Good To Serve Process In Hospitals And Prisons • [ PAGE 11 ] What To Do When You Can’t Really Find The Person You’re Looking For • [ PAGE 12 ] Proven Tricks And Techniques For Effectively and Seamlessly Serving Process • [ PAGE 13 ] How To Serve Process Quickly and Like An Expert
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SPECIAL REPORT: The Essentials To Process Serving
How You Can Easily Get Started In the World of Process Serving Based on my experience and the experience of many other successful process servers, the best way to find work is to get a local listing of all the different process servers who are approved in your district. For example, in Dade County, a list is printed by the courthouse. All the courthouses have these lists of certified process servers. Also, the sheriffs, in certain counties where the program is approved by the sheriff, they have their own lists. You obtain the list and then begin calling these different people on the list. Some of them, you will see, have companies which you can work for. You may also go online, or search the Yellow Pages. You may also go to different resources, organizations, and memberships. You will find out that many hundreds of companies, all over the United States have thousands and thousands of papers that need to be served. If you simply want to work for a company, there is plenty of work out there. There are thousands of documents being filed daily nationwide. There is plenty of work and there is always a need for good process servers. It's an industry that is always growing, and continues to grow. So you can rest assured you’re taking the right path in your decision to become a certified Process Server.
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SPECIAL REPORT: The Essentials To Process Serving
How To Easily Get Through The Legal And Administrative Requirements of Becoming A Process Server Once you decide you want to apply and take the licensing exam, contact the court or the sheriff's office first to find out who runs the program. Speak with the person in charge of the program. They're very nice. They give you a lot of information, including when the application is going to become available. On the given date, you pick up the application, fill it out completely, and submit it together with a copy of your license and your social security card (you will provide the packet). You will provide them with the filing fee, which is generally anywhere from $150 to $250 for the initial application fee. Be sure to provide all of these prior to the deadline. Do not wait until the date of the deadline to turn in your documents; turn it in a couple of days beforehand. Then, after a few days, you’ll receive a letter that tells you whether or not you’ve met all the requirements and passed the background check. If you qualify, the letter will also contain the date of the examination. Different states have different guidelines for process servers, and different counties have their own specific rules, as well. For instance, in Florida, process serving is a regulated industry, which means we're regulated by Tallahassee. The Florida Statute 48 says that you have to be at least eighteen years of age, and you have to be a resident. However, there are states, such as Washington, where it is not a regulated industry; anybody can serve process. You just open up your office, say you're a process server, and you start getting legal documents and serve them. The courts have the information on the specific requirements, and that each county has its own requirements. You could do a quick Google search for their county, plus sheriff and get the phone number, and call it to find out. To be honest, majority of applicants do qualify to take the exams as the requirements for becoming a process server are very easy to meet. For one, you don’t even need a college degree. The only problem is when you have a criminal record. If you have anything criminal in your past, you need to speak to them about your prior arrest and see if it's something that they can work with. Provide them with all the courtcertified documentation of your prior criminal history called the "Final Disposition". This is perhaps the only real impediment, if you have one. But even this you could discuss 3|P age
SPECIAL REPORT: The Essentials To Process Serving
with the director of the program or with the sheriff of the program, and possibly you’ll still get through. Regarding the exams, you need to review and study your manual, Chapter 48, prior to taking the test. It is a small chapter that lists all the rules for serving process. It is not complicated. Then be sure to come to the examination early. Different counties have different passing grades. Some say you need 70%, some 80%. Given the relative ease of the exam, most takers pass the exam. In all likelihood, you will pass, too. Now you’re ready to start in the high-paying world of process serving.
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SPECIAL REPORT: The Essentials To Process Serving
The Legal Documents That You’ll be Handling As A Process Server There are literally hundreds of thousands of documents being filed daily nationwide. That’s why there’s plenty of work and there is always a need for good process servers in this industry that is always growing. For instance, you could be serving summons. It's a legal document that tells someone they have been sued. Sometimes, it's not necessarily that they have been sued, but that someone is giving them legal notice to stop doing something. For example, it may be an injunction stopping you from using someone's secret trade list, and contacting the opposing party's clients. That could be an injunction. You could be working with someone suing another corporation. For instance, you could have Writ of Garnishment, where a judgment has already been entered, and you need to go to a particular bank and serve that document at the bank, so they can freeze certain accounts. You could be serving various orders ranging from contempt orders, or orders requiring someone to appear in court for a trial. Or, you may have notices of hearing requesting that someone come to a hearing on a specific date and time. These are known as court summons. These documents may come from a host of different sources. They could come from the government, the child support industry, the Department of Justice, or private clients who are also preparing their own documentation, preparing their own small claims, or their own divorces. You have a whole array of documents coming in from different areas. You may even have documents coming from different countries that need to be served here, in a particular area. If you enjoy working with lawyers, becoming a process server will put you exactly in the right spot. You’ll be working mostly with attorneys or law firms. But you’ll also enjoy working with diverse clients. They could be corporations, where they have in-house council. They could be banks. They could be simple corporations that do their own paperwork and don't have in-house council, per se, and they are just filing documents on their own behalf. Indeed, your position as a process server will be highly stimulating and rewarding. And in the midst of all this busyness, you feel the inner satisfaction of knowing that you are playing a significant role in the legal process. 5|P age
SPECIAL REPORT: The Essentials To Process Serving
How To Serve Process In Residences and Corporations So what are the best times to serve a residence? Obviously, the best time to serve a residential location is very early in the morning. 6:00 a.m. is a great time to serve people. Generally speaking, people are home at that time. I know it’s very hard to get up because it's very early in the morning, but if you want to get your services done and done quickly, this is the most effective way. Alternatively, you can wait until people return home after work. Sometime between 7:30 p.m., 8:30 p.m., 9:30 p.m. – 10:30 p.m. or 11:00 p.m. being the latest. However, avoid knocking on people's doors after 11:00 p.m. because you might frighten them. It's not really a good practice. The later or the earlier you go is the best time. But when you see you’re not getting them either very early or late at night, they must have some sort of late schedule and would be home during the day. So you should also go during the day. If you’re going to try the first and second time, try to do it very early in the morning or late in the evening. But an important word of caution: never go inside a house. Always remember that. So that’s for residences. For commercial locations, you have to go during business hours. Generally, business hours is anywhere between 9:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m. Obviously, if you’re serving a discotheque, you’ll go in the evening hours because they don't open until after 10:00 p.m. or 11:00 p.m. Generally, you have corporate documents, with corporate addresses where you’ll serve people between 9:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m., when someone will be there. If you go too early, you will probably not be able to find the actual officer you’re looking for, or the registered agent you are looking for. You also don't want to go too close to 5:00 p.m. because sometimes people leave before 5:00 p.m. In Florida, there is a statute that is very important that regulates our industry. It allows us to serve a registered agent between 10:00 a.m. and 12:00 p.m. Basically, it says that if you attempt to serve a registered agent between 10:00 a.m. and 12:00 p.m. and the registered agent is not there, you may go ahead and serve an 6|P age
SPECIAL REPORT: The Essentials To Process Serving
employee at the corporate place of doing business, at any time. That is very important and helpful when you are serving corporate documents. Remember to take advantage of this to save a lot of time and effort. So now you know the insider secrets to serving a person in his or her residence, and to serving process in corporate location.
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SPECIAL REPORT: The Essentials To Process Serving
Working with Deadlines As in any other important matter, there’s always a deadline in process serving. For instance, if you have a summons in a complaint, you generally have one hundred twenty days to serve it to the respondent. However, if that period of time passes and yet the person you’re looking for could not be located, the plaintiff (the person who is initiating the lawsuit), through his attorney, can request an extension of time. He can explain to the court, "These are the addresses we have been to; these are the things we've been doing to locate this person, and we haven't been able to do so. We would like to request an extension to try to find this person". If you’re handling a subpoena, you should serve it before the date specified in the document for the concerned party to appear in court for a trial or deposition. For instance, if you have a subpoena you need to serve to Mr. Gutierrez, the subpoena may say they're going to take Mr. Gutierrez's deposition by February 27. Before February 27, you have to locate Mr. Gutierrez, and serve that document. If the date passes, but you haven’t yet located Mr. Gutierrez, then you have to actually advise your client that you weren't able to locate that person and close out that job as a non-serve. And then the court will have to reissue a subpoena with a different date. So you really do have deadlines, and you have to abide by those deadlines.
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SPECIAL REPORT: The Essentials To Process Serving
Why It’s Actually Good To Serve Process In Hospitals And Prisons So what is the best time to serve in a hospital? For medical facilities, you can generally go anytime between 9:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m. You may not know it, but hospitals and doctor’s clinics actually take a number legal documents every day. It could be five, ten, or fifteen, depending on how popular the doctor is. Usually, you will serve medical record subpoenas at doctors' offices. And here’s the reason why hospitals are one of the best places to serve process: There is always a receptionist or secretary there to accept your documents, and they usually do not give you a hard time. They give you their first name, last initial, and you just leave the documents with them. And on your part, you just record everything and prepare the documentation. That’s how easy and convenient when you are serving medical record subpoenas at doctors' offices. It's a good job. It's not hectic, at all, and it's non-confrontational. So, you might want to consider putting medical facilities on the top of your list once you become a certified Process Server. They are definitely at the top of my list of favorite places to serve. Now let’s discuss serving process to people in jail. Yes, as a process server, you’ll get to serve a lot of people in jail, including famous people who have been arrested for different things. Different jail facilities have different rules on serving prisoners. For instance, they may require you to send a letter listing your documents, what you're going to be serving, letting them know your ID number, giving them a copy of your identification as a process server, and letting them know that you want to serve this particular inmate. They’ll make the arrangements so that when they give you a date and time, you come in and this inmate is already sitting in the lobby or in a room, and you just hand him the documents. Those services are very easy; they're monitored. However, it's a little bit more timeconsuming, of course, because you have to go through clearance at a particular jail facility. And if you’re coming into a federal prison, here are two additional points you should be aware of. 9|P age
SPECIAL REPORT: The Essentials To Process Serving
You cannot bring in a cell phone; you have to leave it in the car. They have a dress code requirement. If you’re a woman, you have to be wearing a longsleeve shirt, no shorts, and no short pants. They have to be long pants. But here’s the bonus for serving process in a prison. Because it takes time, you can charge extra!
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SPECIAL REPORT: The Essentials To Process Serving
What To Do When You Can’t Really Find The Person You’re Looking For In my last lesson, you learned that it’s possible to obtain an extension for summons, or issue a new subpoena. The assumption there of course is that you’ll eventually find the person named in the legal documents. But what if, after the lapse of the extension of summons or expiry of the new subpoena, you can’t still locate the person? What then? Obviously, you can't serve everyone. Sometimes, you do get papers for which you can't find the person or the person is becoming very evasive. They will refuse to open the door; will lie at work and say they aren't there. They may even open the door to you and say, "That person has moved out of the country," and yet you’re speaking with the person you’re trying to find. You do get those types of papers. That's why it is very important that every time you go to a particular service, you should be aware and alert to everything that transpires, including the conversations you have with the person. Write down everything, and then put all that information into an affidavit. In the event you’re unable to serve someone, go back to what we mentioned before on constructive service. For instance, if it’s a divorce, they can publish it in a local newspaper, once a judge has approved it. Another instance, if it's some sort of litigation, and you’re in Florida, you can serve the Secretary of State. There are many ways of trying to find someone, as well. You can try to locate people by doing "skip tracing". That is a term we use in the legal field to kind of run different databases that investigators use to locate people and their last known address. By skip tracing, you find people's last known address or their parents’ address and contact numbers. You can interview them and ask them questions. You may also find people's old telephone numbers that you can call. There is also something you can do through the post office, which is called a "postal request". That is based on the Freedom of Information Act, which is a federal act allowing us, as process servers, to write letters to the post office and request forwarding information. This is very helpful. In fact, you can use many different types of sources to find different people, not only in certain areas, but all over the United States. 11 | P a g e
SPECIAL REPORT: The Essentials To Process Serving
Proven Tricks And Techniques For Effectively and Seamlessly Serving Process Yes, there are different ways to serve a process other than serving it directly to the person named in the documents. For instance, you have an individual that has been sued, say "John Doe." Supposing that when you get to his residence, his wife comes out to say that he’s not there. Do you need to come back a second time around? Fortunately, you don’t have to. Under “Substitute Service”, you may leave the papers with the wife, or with any other member of his household. Just make sure to ask the substitute recipient to give the documents to the person actually named in the process. Also make sure that the person substituting should be fifteen years or older. You may also substitute serve a corporation. For instance, you do not necessarily need to serve the president or the vice president, or any officer. You may go ahead and serve an employee at the corporate place of doing business, at any time. In all instances, at the end, you may also serve through Tallahassee. That is very important. A lot of people do not know about the procedure to serve through Tallahassee. It's a great statute that we have here, in Florida, at least. We automatically appoint a Secretary of State, if we are unable to locate the person. Finally, we can also do "Constructive Service". Constructive service is service through a newspaper and publication. There is a whole procedure on that. In my “Process Server Secrets Course”, these and many more alternative ways of serving are discussed in more detail, particularly what you need to do to serve a corporation.
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SPECIAL REPORT: The Essentials To Process Serving
How To Serve Process Quickly and Like An Expert Every time you go to a particular home, you always have to be alert as to your surroundings. You always have to see whether or not this home has a surveillance camera, a buzzer, or an electric gate that prevents you from knocking at the door. Does this home have dogs that prevent you from knocking at the front door? Did you see anybody? It’s also very important to go speak with neighbors. You can speak with the neighbor. Say hi, and introduce yourself. You can show them your credentials, and say, "Do you know your neighbor? I'm looking for Mr. Gutierrez. Do you know if Mr. Gutierrez lives here?" The neighbor may say, "No, Mr. Gutierrez moved out two years ago". It may be the Smiths that live there now. This is an important piece of information because now that someone has informed you that the person you’re looking for is not at the address given, you don't have to continue going. You can now report that information to the attorney, and either move on to a second address or just return the documents to the attorney. It’s not in every case that you would knock on the neighbor's door, but it's helpful. Because the more information you obtain on your first try, the better off you’ll be. It’s going to help you avoid waste time. This also applies if you go to a condominium. You can ask the front desk, whether the person you’re looking for still lives there or has already moved out. Doing so can save you a lot of time and effort. You can do all these sorts of things without having a private investigative license. Your job is to try to serve process documents as quickly as possible. The better you are, the more documents you will get. You have to be very resourceful, or you’d just be wasting time, money and gas going to the same places. In my “Process Server Secrets Course”, you’ll learn more insider tips and techniques that can help you deliver process documents quickly and efficiently. That way you’ll not only help speed up the legal process, you’ll also be able to serve more people or business. And isn’t that what you want to achieve as a high performing process server? So visit here right now to get all the details.
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