By the eLitigant Editorial Team · Reviewed for current forms, fees & procedure · How we check our guides
Where money claims are filed: the official portal is www.moneyclaims.service.gov.uk — HMCTS’s own Money Claims service. It is new (still badged beta), and following the 181st Practice Direction update there is no upper limit on the amount you can claim through it — and if you qualify for Help with Fees, the issue fee itself can be reduced to zero, whatever the size of the claim. New to the portal? Read our step-by-step walkthrough.
Last reviewed: August 2026 · For use in England & Wales
Quick answer: You can make a money claim yourself, directly, using the government’s official online Money Claims service — no claims company, no middleman, and no cut taken out of what you recover. The route is: send a properly drafted letter before claim, then start your claim at GOV.UK — make a court claim for money, which takes you into the official Money Claims service. There is no upper limit on the value of a specified money claim you can issue online: the 181st CPR Practice Direction Update, in force 27 February 2025, removed the words “not exceeding £25,000 including interest” from PD 51R paragraph 2.1(3)(a). This guide walks the whole route, end to end.
Why claim it yourself?
When someone owes you money, a whole industry offers to pursue it for you. Claims-management companies are a legitimate part of that landscape — but be clear about the trade you are making: they run the claim on your behalf, and their fee comes out of what you recover.
The alternative is simpler than most people realise. The official online claim service was built for litigants in person. It asks its questions in plain English, one screen at a time, and it was designed from the start so that ordinary people can use it without representation. When you claim directly:
- You keep 100% of what you recover. Every pound the defendant pays is yours — no percentage is deducted at the end.
- You stay in control. Whether to accept an offer, negotiate, or press on to judgment is your decision, made on your timetable.
- You deal with the court directly. Notifications, deadlines and the judgment come straight to you — not to an office handling hundreds of files.
This is not about going it alone without support. Help is available at every step — from free official guidance to professional-standard drafting. It is about who the claim belongs to: the decisions, and the recovery, stay yours.
| Claiming it yourself | Using an intermediary | |
|---|---|---|
| Who drafts the claim | You do — with whatever drafting support you choose | The company drafts it on your behalf |
| Who keeps the recovery | You keep everything the defendant pays | The company’s fee is deducted from your recovery |
| Who makes the decisions | You — settle, negotiate or proceed on your terms | You are consulted, but the company runs the process |
| Who the court corresponds with | You, directly | The company, which passes information on to you |
| Who owns the case | You, from first letter to judgment | The company manages it under its own procedures |
Step one: the letter before claim — prevention is better than cure
Most money disputes never need a courtroom, and the courts are built to keep it that way. The Pre-Action Protocols expect you to set out your case in writing before you issue: who you are, what you are owed and why, and a clear deadline to respond — 14 days for most claims, or 30 days under the Pre-Action Protocol for Debt Claims when you are chasing an individual for a debt.
A properly drafted letter before claim does two jobs at once. It very often gets you paid without going near a court — a large share of disputes end at this stage, because a well-constructed letter shows the other side that you know the route and are ready to take it. And if it does not, it protects your position on costs when you do issue; skipping it can count against you later.
Our full guide covers exactly what the letter must include and how to send it: Letter Before Claim — the pre-action letter that often settles it.
The official route: two steps
If the deadline in your letter passes without payment, the route into court runs through two official web addresses — both free to visit, both run by the government.
1. Start at GOV.UK
gov.uk/make-court-claim-for-money is the front door. It confirms that your claim is eligible for the online service and hands you into the claim form itself.
2. The Money Claims service
moneyclaims.service.gov.uk/make-claim is the official portal — often called OCMC. You sign in with an HMCTS account, answer its questions screen by screen, pay the issue fee (or enter your Help with Fees reference), and the court service issues your claim.
If you want the fuller picture before you begin, this guide sits at the head of a complete cluster: how to start a money claim explains why the online service replaced the paper N1 for most fixed-sum claims, our main OCMC resource gives the complete overview, and the screen-by-screen walkthrough shows you every page of the service before you meet it.
Is your claim “specified”?
The online service is for specified claims — a fixed sum you can put a precise figure on. An unpaid invoice, a loan that was never repaid, rent arrears, a deposit that was not returned, goods paid for and not delivered: all specified. If the amount needs the court’s assessment — damages to be decided rather than calculated — the route differs; our guide to choosing the right route covers the fork.
No upper limit on your claim
Whatever the size of the specified sum you are owed, the online service can take it. The 181st CPR Practice Direction Update, in force 27 February 2025, removed the words “not exceeding £25,000 including interest” from PD 51R paragraph 2.1(3)(a) — so the online money claims pilot no longer has an upper value limit. If you have been told that online claims stop at £25,000, that was true once; it is not true now.
The court fee — and how to have it reduced or waived
Issuing a claim carries a court fee, scaled to the amount you are claiming. If you are on a low income or receive a qualifying benefit, Help with Fees — the court service’s own scheme — can reduce that fee substantially or remove it altogether. The order matters: apply first, keep the reference number you are given, and enter it when the claim service asks about the fee, before you pay. Our dedicated guide walks through the application: make a money claim without paying the court fee.
What the portal asks — and how to answer it well
The service’s questions are plain, but your answers become a formal statement of case, so quality matters. Expect to provide:
- The parties — full, accurate names and addresses for you and the defendant. Getting the defendant’s legal identity right is the single most common stumble.
- The timeline — what happened and when, in order, with dates.
- The particulars of claim — the heart of the claim: the agreement between you, what the defendant was required to do, what went wrong, and exactly what you are owed as a result.
- The amount — the specified sum, itemised where it has parts.
- Interest — whether you claim it, on what basis, and from what date.
Interest under section 69
Unless your contract sets its own rate, you can claim interest under section 69 of the County Courts Act 1984 at 8% per year, simple. The arithmetic is straightforward: yearly interest is the sum owed multiplied by 8%; the daily rate is that figure divided by 365. The portal asks for the date you want interest to run from — typically the date the money fell due — and the daily rate carries on accruing until judgment or payment.
Where Chris comes in
The hard part of a money claim is not the clicking — it is the drafting. Tell Chris what happened, once, in your own words. He drafts every answer the portal will ask for — the particulars, the timeline, the amount and the section 69 interest calculation — to a professional standard, in minutes. Then you copy each answer into the official portal yourself, check it, and sign the statement of truth; the court service issues your claim. Your claim, in your words at their best — the same machinery, in your hands. And because Chris drafts all formal documents and correspondence to the same standard, the letter before claim and everything that follows can be prepared the same way.
After you issue: the 28-day clock
Once the court issues your claim, a firm deadline starts running: the defendant must respond by 4pm on the 28th day after the claim is issued. Note that it runs from the date of issue — not “14 days from service”, which is a common misreading borrowed from a different procedure.
The defendant can pay in full, admit the debt (in full or in part, with or without a proposal to pay by instalments), or defend. Settlement remains open at every stage — many claims resolve as soon as the defendant sees the claim has actually been issued. And if the defendant does nothing by the deadline, you can request judgment in default. Our guides on the full post-issue timeline and default judgment cover both branches in detail.
Free help, every step of the way
You are never on your own with this. The GOV.UK guidance linked above is free and official. Citizens Advice offers free, independent help with money disputes. And the Money Claims helpdesk answers questions about using the service itself: contactocmc@justice.gov.uk or 0300 123 7050.
Making a money claim yourself is not the budget option or the brave option — it is the route the modern County Court was built around. Send the letter. Use the official service. Keep what you recover.
Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.