ITALY Law and Practice Contributed by: Renato Fiumalbi, Simone Barnaba, Alessandra Lucchini and Valeria Daloiso, Eversheds Sutherland
3.6 Failure to Respond If the defendant, after being properly served, does not respond to a lawsuit, he/she is declared in default and the proceedings continue. The defaulting party must be served with certain documents, such as the order admitting formal hearing or briefs containing new claims. The defaulting party may appear in court at any time during the proceedings up to the last hearing. In doing so, the defaulting party can be authorised by the court to carry out activities that are precluded at that stage of the proceed- ings if he/she proves that he/she was not aware of the proceedings due to the nullity of the writ of summons or of its service or that his/her appear- ance was prevented by a cause not attributable to him/her. 3.7 Representative or Collective Actions Articles 840-bis to 840-sexiesdecies of the Ital- ian Code of Civil Procedure are dedicated to collective proceedings, in which class action is precisely regulated. By the class action, a non-profit organisation or association, whose statutory objectives include the protection of “homogeneous individual rights” (eg, rights of consumers, professionals, companies, investors, etc) or each member of the class may bring an action against the author of misconducts and torts in order to ascertain the liability and obtain damages. Only organisations and associations registered in a public list established at the Ministry of Jus- tice may bring the class action, without preju- dice to the legal standing of each member of the class.
• the specific description of the facts and grounds of law on which the summons is based and the specific indication of the means of proof on which the plaintiff intends to rely and, in particular, the documents which he/she produces in court; • the date of the hearing; and • an invitation to the defendant to file the state- ment of defence within 70 days before the date of the hearing and a series of warnings to the defendant, with the warning that filing an appearance after the aforementioned time limits entails some forfeitures, that the techni- cal defence by a lawyer is compulsory and that the party, where the legal requirements are met, may apply for legal aid. The plaintiff is permitted to amend the claims made in the writ of summons with an additional brief filed before the first hearing. The plaintiff cannot file additional claims, unless this is nec- essary in response to the defendant’s counter- claims or defences. 3.5 Rules of Service In ordinary proceedings, the plaintiff must serve the writ of summons on the defendant(s). This service is typically carried out by the court’s bailiff at the plaintiff’s request. Alternatively, it can be performed directly by the plaintiff’s attor- ney via registered letter or certified email. For services abroad, the court’s bailiff generally handles the process at the plaintiff’s request, in accordance with the relevant EU regulations (for services to be made within the European Union), the Hague Convention of 15 November 1965 on the Service Abroad of Judicial and Extrajudicial Documents in Civil or Commercial Matters or other applicable international conventions or bilateral treaties.
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