§ 687.040.Liability For Actions Taken In Conformance With Title; Loss of Personal Property By Fire, Theft, Injury Or Damage

Levying officers act on someone else's information and hold someone else's property, and § 687.040 protects them for doing both responsibly. Subdivision (a) shields an officer or registered process server from liability for actions taken in conformance with this title — including relying on the judgment creditor's written instructions or information a registered process server supplies — unless the officer has actual knowledge that the information is wrong. That protection doesn't erase the creditor's own exposure: if the officer acts on incorrect instructions, the creditor may still be liable.

Subdivision (b) covers property already in the officer's hands. Unless the officer was negligent in caring for or handling it, the officer isn't liable to either the debtor or the creditor for loss by fire, theft, injury, or other damage while the property sits in a warehouse or other storage, in a keeper's custody, or in transit to or from storage.

Together with §§ 687.010 through 687.030, this section defines the working reality of levying officers: they follow instructions and take custody of property, and the law protects them for doing that job in good faith, while still holding them to ordinary care once property is in their hands.