A ground breaking judgement in the Pretoria High Court has accepted the digitally registered delivery of a Section 129 final letter of demand for payment as the basis for granting a default judgement.

This follows similar default judgements handed down in the Randburg Magistrate’s Court in 2018, which were the first in South Africa to afford registered digital channels, such as Registered SMS and Registered Email, the same status as conventional registered letters. 

This judgement entrenches the principle of stare decisis that ensures that cases with similar scenarios and facts are approached in the same way and binds other High Courts or Magistrate’s Courts to accept registered digital communication in such applications, unless it is overturned by a higher court. 

This follows a recent North Gauteng High Court instruction to an applicant’s attorney to serve legal notices via electronic registered mail, adding additional impetus to the judiciary’s acceptance of the digital alternative to conventional paper-based communication. 

The registered digital communication that made the Pretoria High Court judgement possible was facilitated by Registered Communication, South Africa’s leading registered communications provider, and one of its software partners, Swordfish Software, a debt collection software provider. 

Using a track and trace concept that’s reminiscent of traditional registered mail, Registered Communication can deliver an instant electronic certificate and detailed audit report to clients as evidence that communication has been sent and delivered by SMS or emailed to recipients. 

“Our solution makes it possible for legal notices that are carefully guarded by specific legislation protecting consumers’ rights to be distributed electronically with the same legal status as traditional registered post,” says Bradley Gilmour, director at Registered Communication. 

“The successful delivery of digital registered communications is stark in comparison to those delivered by traditional means,” he explains. “In a recent campaign we ran with a client, less than three percent of their letters sent by conventional registered post had been delivered successfully by the end of the second month, while just short of 97% had been delivered, accepted and certified digitally, by the end of the first month.” 

The service complies with Sections 12 and 19(4) of the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act 25 of 2002 (the ECT Act ), with its registration certificate which includes proof of content, delivery and receipt at the recipient’s location, being deemed sufficient in the serving of legal documentation in terms of Section 129 of the National Credit Act. 

Registered Communication enables businesses to send, track and prove delivery of electronic documents by both Registered Email and Registered SMS (up to 1224 characters) and either the sender or recipient to authenticate a certificate on the website. It also increases business’s efficiency, reduces costs, and fast-tracks their adaptation to quicker, more cost-effective paperless operations.

It does this by effectively being the third-party witness to all essential communications conducted through digital channels, so recipients cannot deny having received a document, and neither can they dispute the contents of these communications. 

“This judgement confirms that the days of physical letters of demand going missing or being rejected could soon be a thing of the past,” says Jacques Lubbe, director at Groenewald Lubbe Inc. “The laborious, time consuming, and expensive paper-based practices that have always been required as part of a Section 129 action, will soon be redundant.”