New York procedural guides

Plain-English guides to the New York Civil Practice Law and Rules, each one tied to the rules it relies on. Every rule named in a guide has its own page with the official text.

• Served in New York: is it 20 days or 30? It depends on how they served youCPLR 320 sets 20 days for in-hand service and 30 days for most other methods — including deliver-and-mail, the method most often used. Here's how to tell which applies.
• Vacating a New York default judgment: CPLR 5015, CPLR 317, and which one fitsCPLR 5015(a)(1) gives one year from service of notice of entry. CPLR 317 gives a different route — up to five years — to a defendant who wasn't personally handed the summons.
• New York summary judgment: the note of issue starts the clock, and 120 days ends itCPLR 3212(a) ties the summary-judgment deadline to the note of issue — 120 days unless the court sets an earlier date. Late motions need leave on good cause shown.
• The New York 90-day demand: what CPLR 3216 requires before a case can be dismissed for delayCPLR 3216 lets a court dismiss for failure to prosecute — but only after three conditions precedent, including a written demand giving 90 days to file a note of issue.
• New York discovery sanctions: CPLR 3126's threshold, and why "wilfully" does the workCPLR 3124 lets you move to compel. CPLR 3126 supplies the sanctions — but only against a party who refuses to obey an order or wilfully fails to disclose.
• The New York motion to dismiss: eleven grounds, one motion, and three different waiver rulesCPLR 3211 allows one pre-answer motion on any of eleven grounds. Which ground you pick decides whether it survives being left out — and one of them has a separate 60-day trap.
• Amending a New York pleading: three windows under CPLR 3025(a), and what leave requiresCPLR 3025(a) gives one amendment without leave through any of three separate windows. After that, leave is "freely given" — but the motion must attach the proposed pleading marked up.
• New York TROs and preliminary injunctions: no expiry date, a mandatory undertaking, and vacatur without noticeCPLR article 63 puts no fixed expiry on a temporary restraining order, requires an undertaking before a preliminary injunction issues, and lets a restrained defendant move to vacate without notice.
• New York discovery deadlines: twenty days, almost everywhereThe CPLR runs on 20 days — to answer interrogatories, to object to a document notice, and as the minimum notice period for production. It is the shortest set in the country.
• Serving a New York summons: deliver-and-mail, nail-and-mail, and the ten days that followCPLR 308 sets five methods of serving a natural person in New York — and for two of them, service is not complete until ten days after proof of service is filed.
• New York statutes of limitations: six, three, two and a half, and oneNew York's CPLR limitations periods run six years for contract, three for personal injury and property damage, two and a half for medical malpractice, and one for the intentional torts.
• Reargue or renew in New York: two different motions, one of which has a deadlineCPLR 2221 splits post-order relief into reargument — 30 days, no new facts — and renewal, which requires new facts and a reasonable justification for not offering them the first time.
• The New York bill of particulars: thirty days, and objecting to one item doesn't buy time on the restCPLR 3042 gives thirty days to respond to a demand for a bill of particulars — and objecting to some items does not excuse responding in full to the ones you don't object to.
• The New York notice to admit: twenty days, a sworn response, and silence admitsCPLR 3123 deems every matter admitted unless the responding party serves a sworn denial within twenty days — and an unreasonable refusal to admit can carry the cost of proving the point.
• Quashing a New York subpoena: ask the issuer first, and move promptlyCPLR 2304 requires a motion to quash a subpoena to be made promptly — and where the subpoena is not returnable in a court, you must first ask the person who issued it to withdraw or modify it.
• Enforcing a New York money judgment: 10% of gross, and two bank restraints a yearNew York caps an income execution at 10% of gross income and limits a creditor to two restraining notices per year on a natural person's bank account.
• Your New York bank account is frozen: the exemption claim form, and the 20 days you have to send itCPLR 5222-a makes a restraining notice void if the creditor did not serve an exemption notice and two claim forms with it. The debtor has 20 days to return the form, the bank must release the funds 8 days later, and two automatic exemptions protect money before anyone files anything.
• Finding the money after a New York judgment: the information subpoena and the turnover orderCPLR 5224 lets a judgment creditor mail written questions to banks, employers and anyone else who may know where the assets are, answerable under oath within seven days. CPLR 5225 then turns those assets over — by motion against the debtor, by special proceeding against anyone else.
• Renewing a New York judgment: the lien runs ten years, the judgment runs twentyA New York money judgment is enforceable for twenty years but its real-property lien lasts only ten. CPLR 5014 lets the creditor bring a renewal action in the final year of the ten, and the renewal lien takes effect exactly when the old one expires.

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