After you go to court

Get started

Learn the basics about family courts and laws in Alberta before you take steps after going to court.

Next, make sure you understand what your role was in the court process. Were you the applicantapplicant The person who applies for a court order. or the respondentrespondent The person who responds to the applicant’s request for an order.? Your next steps depend on knowing this. If you’re not sure, look at your court documents and see what label is beside your name.

Deal with your court order

A court order takes effect when the justicejustice The title for judges in both the Alberta Court of Justice and the Court of King’s Bench of Alberta. grants it unless the order says otherwise. This is true even if you do not have a physical copy of the order yet.

For example, if you go to court and the justicejustice The title for judges in both the Alberta Court of Justice and the Court of King’s Bench of Alberta. verbally makes an order, the order takes effect right away even if you do not yet have a paper copy of the order.

The paper copy of the order can be prepared a few different ways:

• If you were the applicantapplicant The person who applies for a court order., you may have taken a mostly complete order to court with you on the scheduled date for the justicejustice The title for judges in both the Alberta Court of Justice and the Court of King’s Bench of Alberta. to complete and sign right in court.
• If either the applicantapplicant The person who applies for a court order. or respondentrespondent The person who responds to the applicant’s request for an order. has a lawyer, the court may ask the lawyer to write the order after your court date that captures what the justicejustice The title for judges in both the Alberta Court of Justice and the Court of King’s Bench of Alberta. said in court.
• If neither of you has a lawyer, the court may prepare the order after your court date that captures what the justicejustice The title for judges in both the Alberta Court of Justice and the Court of King’s Bench of Alberta. said in court. The court clerk will have the justicejustice The title for judges in both the Alberta Court of Justice and the Court of King’s Bench of Alberta. sign it and will contact the applicantapplicant The person who applies for a court order. when the order is ready.

Once the order is ready, the applicantapplicant The person who applies for a court order. must file it with the court. Do so using the same file number and courthouse as is on your applicationapplication A court appearance where the applicant asks the court for an order to resolve some or all of their legal issues. court documents. Then you must serve a filed copy of the order on the respondentrespondent The person who responds to the applicant’s request for an order..

Figure out costs

At the end of a court hearing, the more successful partyparty An individual or business involved in a court case. can ask the justicejustice The title for judges in both the Alberta Court of Justice and the Court of King’s Bench of Alberta. to order the less successful partyparty An individual or business involved in a court case. to pay costscosts Money the more successful party in a court proceeding can ask the justice to order the less successful party to pay. Costs reimburse the more successful party for having to go through the court process to get a resolution..

Costs reimburse the more successful partyparty An individual or business involved in a court case. for having to go through the court process to resolve the issue. Costs that a justicejustice The title for judges in both the Alberta Court of Justice and the Court of King’s Bench of Alberta. may allow are set out in a schedule to the Alberta Rules of Court. They include court fees and out-of-pocket expenses, known as disbursements. Costs can sometimes include the more successful partyparty An individual or business involved in a court case.’s legal fees.

The less successful partyparty An individual or business involved in a court case. does not automatically pay costscosts Money the more successful party in a court proceeding can ask the justice to order the less successful party to pay. Costs reimburse the more successful party for having to go through the court process to get a resolution. to the more successful partyparty An individual or business involved in a court case.. The court decides what costscosts Money the more successful party in a court proceeding can ask the justice to order the less successful party to pay. Costs reimburse the more successful party for having to go through the court process to get a resolution. will be. Before making a decision, the court may ask each partyparty An individual or business involved in a court case. to submit a written summary of what they think costscosts Money the more successful party in a court proceeding can ask the justice to order the less successful party to pay. Costs reimburse the more successful party for having to go through the court process to get a resolution. should be and why.

Appeal the court’s decisions

An appeal is a challenge to a court’s decision. You cannot appeal a decision just because you don’t like it. There are legal rules that say whether you can appeal the decision and what you have to convince the court of in your appeal.

You usually must show the justicejustice The title for judges in both the Alberta Court of Justice and the Court of King’s Bench of Alberta. made a factual or legal error. During an appeal, sometimes the court will hear new evidence. Other times it will only review the evidence before the previous court along with its reasons for the decision.

Start the process

You usually have only 30 days from the date the court makes the decision to start the appeal process, so it’s important to get started right away.

You file an appeal with the next higher court. For example, if your case was in the Court of Justice, you would appeal the decision in the Court of King’s Bench. If your case was in the Court of King’s Bench, you would appeal the decision in the Court of Appeal.

Sometimes you need permission to appeal a decision. To get permission, you must apply to the next higher court. A justicejustice The title for judges in both the Alberta Court of Justice and the Court of King’s Bench of Alberta. in that court will review your applicationapplication A court appearance where the applicant asks the court for an order to resolve some or all of their legal issues. and decide if your appeal should go ahead. At this point, they are only deciding on whether you can make the appeal, not on whether your appeal is successful. If the court does not grant you permission, known as leave to appeal, you cannot appeal the decision.

Other times you automatically have a right to appeal the decision. You start the appeal process by filing and serving a notice to appeal in the next higher court.

During the appeal process, you must continue to follow the original court decision. At the end of the appeal, the court can:

• dismiss the appeal, meaning the original decision is still valid
• overturn the previous decision and make its own decision
• overturn the previous decision and require the lower court to hear the case again and make a new decision

It is a good idea to get legal advice if you want to appeal a court’s decision. A lawyer can let you know if you have a good reason to appeal and how to start the appeal. They can also help you with the process as appeals are very technical cases.

Go back to court

Sometimes you will have to go back to court. Reasons for doing so include:

• the other person is not following the court order
• you need to change the court order
• you need the court to make a decision about other issues

When you go back to court to deal with issues within the same case, use the same court file number and courthouse so your court file stays together.

The exception to this is if you must move your case to another court because you need to use different laws. For example, if you were using the Family Law Act in the Court of Justice to deal with child support, you will need to move your case to the Court of King’s Bench if you now want to file for divorce.