July 1 marks beginning of mandatory service by e-mail

In an opinion issued last week, the Florida Supreme Court created Rule of Judicial Administration 2.516 requiring email service of all papers after the initial summons and complaint. New rule 2.515 similarly requires an attorney’s signature block include his or her primary email address, and any secondary email addresses.

The rules take effect July 1, 2012, and apply to all state civil and appellate cases. Note the following specifics:

• Upon appearing in a proceeding, a lawyer must serve a designation of a primary email address (and may designate two secondary addresses) for receiving service.
• If an attorney fails to designate an email address, service may be made on that attorney at the email address on record with the Florida Bar.
• Service by e-mail is deemed complete when the e-mail is sent.
• Service by email is treated as service by mail for purposes of the computation of time.
• E-mail service is made by attaching a copy of the document to be served in PDF format to an e-mail. 
• The subject line of the e-mail must contain the words “SERVICE OF COURT DOCUMENT” in all capital letters, followed by the case number of the relevant proceeding. 
• The body of the e-mail must identify the court in which the proceeding is pending, the case number, the name of the initial party on each side, the title of each document served with that e-mail, and the sender’s name and telephone number. 
• Any document served by email may be signed by the “/s/” format, but the filed original must be signed in accordance with the applicable rule of procedure.
• The e-mail and attachments together may not exceed 5 megabytes in size; e-mails that exceed the size requirement must be divided into separate e-mails (no one of which may exceed 5 megabytes) and labeled sequentially in the subject line.