How long do I have to respond to divorce papers after being served? 43 Answers as of July 29, 2011

We are divorce lawyers in Augusta, Ga. We recommend you retain a divorce atotrney ASAP because, generally, you would have 30 days after service to file an answer. Discuss this with your attorney soon. Good luck!

Your Response to the Petition must be filed and served within 30 days after you are served. If you fail to timely file and serve your Response, your spouse can file a request that the Court enter your default. So long as your Response is filed and served before your spouse files a request that the Court enter your default, you could potentially file and serve your Response after the 30-day limit, but you would be taking an unreasonable risk not to file and serve your Response within the requisite 30-day time limit. The expenseof a Motion to Set Aside Default and the risk that the Court might not grant that Motion makeit unwise for you to delay filingand serving your Response beyond the 30-day time limit.

To Whom It May Concern Thirty (30) days. You have thirty days before the other spouse can movefordefault.

You have 30 days to file an Answer from the date you are served.

You have twenty days from the date of service to respond to a summons and petition. However, you may have been served with other documents at the same time. Some of those other documents have different deadlines. For example, if you were also served with a calendar note, motion, and declaration for temporary orders, you may have less time to respond to those. The exact deadline for responding to a motion varies from county to county in Washington. You would need to know the rules for your particular county to be sure you were meeting the deadline for a response to a motion.

Look at the Summons you were served with. For a Washington divorce, the length of time varies. For personal service in state, 20 days. For other kinds of service it can be 60 or 90 days. To be safe, assume 20 days.

The summons should provide how many days you have to respond. Generally, you have 30 days from the date you were served.

21 days if personally served and 28 days if served by mail.

20 days.

two days after the return date

You have only 30 days from the date of service.

You have 30 days from the date you were served to file an Answer to the Divorce.

You will need to file a response within 20 days after service (the day after you are served is "Day 1"). If you do not file a response, the case may proceed against you by default, meaning that the other party could be awarded exactly what they requested in the Petition for Dissolution, even without your input. This is a bit of an oversimplified explanation - I recommend you speak with an attorney to get a better idea of your rights and obligations in this situation.

Generally you must reply within 15 days; if you live out of state you may have 30 days.

20 days from the date of service, including weekend days. You should probably consult with an attorney.

The summons should state that you have 30 days to respond or file your appearance.

20 days.

You have 20 days to respond unless discovery is served with the complaint

30 days, unless given an extension by the petitioner. The Summons, which you should have been served with the petition, states the 30 day response time on the first page.

Usually 30 days, and do not even think of doing that without counsel. A response needs to include proper legal defenses, an answer, a counterclaim, and may also include other pleadings and discovery. In some cases there will be tactical reasons to do certain things at certain times. Get counsel ASAP.

You should have received a copy of a "Summons" along with the "Complaint" - it should explain that you have 20 days from date of service to respond. If a Motion was served at the same time, the time to respond to that is shorter - ten days, although extensions are often sought and granted. You should confer with qualified counsel quickly.

20 Days.

30 days before a default can be taken, but any time so long as a default has not been entered.

30 days.

The summons should tell you that you have 30 days to respond. There is no such thing as a default judgment in divorce cases, but if you do not timely file defensive pleadings, you can lose your rights to assert a claim. Therefore, you should file an answer within at least 30-45 days.

When the service of process is personal, the Respondent has thirty (30) calendar days to respond to the Petition. If the 30th day is on a weekend, or legal Holiday, the time to respond is to the next court day. If the serves is by substituted service, the time is extended by ten (10) days. If the service is by Notice and Acknowledgment of Receipt, the response time is thirty (30) days from the date placed next to the signature on the Acknowledgment. However, unlike a civil case, the Petitioner must serve additional documents upon the Respondent before a Default may be entered after the time has lapsed for a Response to be filed.

35 days, and you should get on it.

30 days.

The time should be stated in the summonstypically, 20 days.

You have 30 days.

If you were served in Colorado, 20 days from service. If you were served outside Colorado, it is 30 days. However, because the Court cannot enter a final decree of divorce until at least 90 days after you were served, as a practical matter you can file a response and seek appropriate relief from the court any time up to that 90th day without losing the right to present your arguments to the Court.

You have 30 days to respond after service.