Bundle bungles

Badly compiled bundles are a source of unnecessary stress and delay in the course of the hearing. There is a surprisingly large number of ways to get a bundle wrong: the book lists 11 separate errors at paragraph 8.16. Here are three more:

  1. Photocopy double-sided, with parts of different documents appearing on opposite sides of the same page.
  2. Include the same document twice or more.
  3. Punch holes through the pages in a slightly different place each time.

The second can be made even more confusing if in each case there are a few pages missing from the document – but not the same few pages. Occasionally it will be genuinely necessary to include two copies of the same document: for example, where two copies of a typed document have then been separately annotated by two different people in the course of the events that form the subject-matter of the claim. But there is no need to put a document in the bundle a second time just because – for example – it was enclosed in a letter some time after it was originally written. Just put it in in its own chronological place. If the fact that it was enclosed in a later letter matters enough to be discussed at the hearing, everyone can add cross-references to their bundles when it arises.

The third means that if you remove papers from their file or binder to sort them in a different order, you can’t put whole sections of the bundle back onto the rings of the binder: each page has to be individually teased into place. The paper guide on your hole punch is there for a reason.

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