Contested Entry Support

Some files leave the quiet desk. An objector writes. A board issues a show-cause letter. A registrar proposes to refuse, remove, or correct an entry and gives a date by which something must be said.

Contested Entry Support is the preparation of that something: a chronology that a stranger can follow, a bundle that matches the office’s filing rules, and submissions that answer the points actually taken rather than the points we wish had been taken.

We work from the objection letter and the original application. We do not invent a new case in the last fortnight. If the original lodging was weak, the Application File Review should have happened first; we will say so, even when the hearing date makes that sentence unwelcome.

Appearance as an advocate is not automatic. Where the office allows a lay representative or a McKenzie friend, we will discuss it. Where the matter needs counsel, we prepare the bundle for counsel and step back. Tribunal advocacy is a different profession; we will not rent the title.

Fees are quoted after we have read the letter that started the contest. A modest written response to a registrar’s requisition is one figure. A hearing bundle with witnesses and a site history is another. Disbursements for extra extracts and printing the bundle are billed at cost.

If the date on the letterhead is inside ten working days, telephone the rooms rather than waiting on the enquiry form.