The legal press has extensively reported around the High Court ruling on the case of Holt v Allianz Insurance PLC (2023) in the last week.

The claim involved the claimant by his credit hire provider Auxillis bringing a claim for hire charges in the sum of almost £10,400. The credit hire company refused to provide a response at pre-action stage and the Insurer Defendant issued for pre-action disclosure of documents to show that the claimant has been impecunious as the time of hiring.

The court granted the application for disclosure of the claimant’s bank, credit card and savings for the period of hire and 3 months prior to it as well as proof of income for the same period. The claimant hire company appealed.

The High Court considered whether the application for pre-action disclosure satisfied the following requirements as set out in Civil Procedure Rule (CPR) 31.16:

1. The applicant and respondent are likely to be party to subsequent proceedings. Both Allianz and Auxillis were considered likely to be party to proceedings
2. The documents sought would fall within standard disclosure if proceedings had started. The requested documents would likely fall within standard disclosure in any credit hire claim where impecuniosity had not been specifically ruled out; And
3. Pre-action disclosure is desirable in order to dispose fairly of anticipated proceedings, assist the dispute to be resolved without proceedings or save costs. The risk of intrusion was outweighed by the benefit of openness and in keeping with the overriding objective.

The High Court ordered pre-action disclosure.