Court Summons with no court date

Could the domestic issue not have been resolved without involving solicitors?

Makes things very awkward living next door to someone bringing you to court...

Local citizens advice or Garda station to ask the validity of the letter if as you say its a regular thing by the neighbour and their legal council could be classed as harassment and intimidation but again just pop down to either of those two to get clarification.

Is the solicitor's letter actually from a firm of solicitors ?

I ask such a stupid question as I encountered something many years ago where a mock up of a legal letter was sent to somebody with a view to intimidating them.

Secondly, if the summons looks odd that might be consonant with another mocked up document also designed to scare the recipient.

Despite the OP's opening request my inclination would be to get my solicitor to check with the District Court that purportedly issued the summons and ask if they actually issued it.

P.S. OP's solicitor should also check if the firm of solicitors exists.

Yes and Yes.

What did your solicitor say? I can't see what answers you're looking for. You have a pending summons. You have talked to your solicitor. What more do you want?

Reading through this, it does seem wrong that you weren't issued a court date.

https://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/justice/criminal-law/criminal-trial/summons/

Yes. Didn't your solicitor explain this when you spoke??..

Your neighbour is bringing a civil case against you in the circuit court. I would think you have a civil bill. Yes it will say personal injuries summons. It should also say you have ten days to enter an appearance.

I'm surprised your solicitor didn't advise you on the procedures, but you can look them up yourself on courts.ie which will explain it.

Nobody here saw this summons. Probably few have had cause to receive a summons on a domestic dispute with a neighbour. Every one of your questions was an easy ask for your solicitor who has experience and knows exactly what you received.

My guess is you have a Civil Bill.

You need to enter an appearance to state you have grounds for defence.

You then give reasons for this defence and you can at that point issue a counterclaim if you wish

The court registrar then looks at it and in many cases a judge will also look and see if it should proceed to trial. They will see if the case can be mediated or settled without need for a trial

If a trial is needed, the registrar will give you 21 days notice of the court date.

Many aggressive types use civil bills to bully people and judges see through this. You have little to lose by entering an appearance (10 days - but not strict) and then outlining your defence (again a further 10 days, but not strict). To proceed to trial, the complainant will have to fork out a further €130 to the court.

Sure. Might this be of help?

Although I also found this

so maybe something changed.

Previous version was

Perhaps the exception is just the medical negligence claims............which likely aren't relevant to the OP!

Point is that I don't think he would be able to get a PI summons stamped and issued by the courts in the first place without the leave of PIAB. I don't have time to read through all the Court Rules and updating SIs

It's the same. Both were changed in 2017. The previous versions were more explicit. The newer ones appear to allow for the applicant to state why it did not go through PIAB. I am guessing that there is an exception for claims in medical negligence. That would make things consistent with the one I linked to previously. However the rules as stated on courts.ie are not necessarily up to date and you will have to refer to the relevant SIs for any changes. Those SIs are listed though

The OP can ask his solicitor.

It appears that under Rule 15 of Order 19 of RSC, that a defendant must raise their objection to any failure on that regard as a preliminary objection. So I suppose you could file in the hope that the respondent has an idiot solicitor who doesn't spot it and include an objection in their own pleadings.

So given my quick perusal of the available material, it would appear that such a failure is a procedural failure only. It does not automatically extinguish jurisdiction. It's like trying to initiate something after the relevant Statute of Limitations has expired. So that the other side has to raise it. I think that that is the answer. There appears to be an exception for medical negligence claims but I couldn't find anything definitive on that.