Bristol Civil and Family Justice Centre’s car park was subject to a severe flood on Tuesday 27 June 2017. This has rendered the Bristol Civil and Family Justice Centre to be unavailable to house any court hearings or administrative support from HMCTS court staff until further notice.
The following service provision is therefore in place until further notice:-
Counter Services for Civil and Family
The main public counter servicing all civil and family enquiries is temporarily located on the 1st floor at Bristol Magistrates Court, Marlborough Street, Bristol from 9.30am to 2pm (Monday to Friday).
Court hearings
Every effort is being made to keep all listed hearings in Bristol or in close proximity to Bristol. Other court venues such as Bath Magistrates Court, Taunton Combined Court Centre, Gloucester County Court and North Somerset Courthouse in Worle are also being used (if required).
The court listing team will contact parties giving as much notice as possible in the event that travelling to other court venues is required or if your case has to be adjourned due to lack of court room accommodation.
In the event of your case being adjourned this will be supported by a judicial decision as listing is deemed as a judicial function.
Court bundles
Due to limited storage capacity at the temporary venues, all court users are asked to take any bundles with them at the conclusion of the hearing. Any bundles left in venues will be subject to confidential wasting procedures and will not be retained.
Consultation rooms
There are limited consultation rooms available to use in our temporary hearing venues. If you occupy one of these consultation rooms for any reason, please ensure that you remove any possessions including court papers when you leave them. Please do not under any circumstances, leave any items in these rooms as this poses security risks.
E-mail services
This remains unaffected by this incident and due to the current situation is the preferred method of communication but HMCTS appreciate that not all court users have access to e-mail services.
Please note that due to the flood, the court staff have only had limited access to e-mails but that situation is now improving.
As a result there may be a delay in responding to your enquiry. If you are sending e-mails to the court for hearings, please include the case number, date of hearing and the name of the Judge hearing this case (if this is known to you).
The court e-mail addresses are available on the Bristol Civil and Family Justice Centre court finder page:-courttribunalfinder.service.gov.uk.
Payments of court fees and warrant payments.
Our normal service of accepting payments (by all methods) has been restored. Payments can be accepted via the temporary counter services at Bristol Magistrates Court between the hours of 9.30am to 2pm (Monday to Friday) or by telephone to: 0117 9302430 between the hours of 9am to 4pm (Monday to Friday).
Personal Support Unit (PSU)
This service has been re-located to the 1st floor (room adjacent to Court 6) at Bristol Magistrates Court, Marlborough Street, Bristol. They also have a temporary contact number for customers to arrange appointments or enquiries which is 07756 976823.
Postal services
All post destined for the Bristol Civil and Family Justice Centre is being re-directed to Bristol Magistrates Court. As a result there may be a delay in responding to your enquiry or your issuing process. Please defer from contacting the court asking for updates on routine enquiries as this will enable them to deal with backlogs more quickly.
Telephone hearings
Any court users involved in telephone hearings will be provided with the number for their conference provider to call by the listing team giving as much notice as possible.
Telephone services
HMCTS are in the process of restoring the main switchboard number but until then please use the following direct dial numbers:-
Centralised Listing for civil and family cases: 0117 9302411
Family (including Divorce enquiries): 0117 9302442