How are procedural time limits calculated?

Question

José Manuel Alburquerque · Accepted Answer

Court time limits set in days are counted in working days only, so Saturdays, Sundays, public holidays, the month of August and the days from 24 December to 6 January do not count. The time limit starts on the day after notification and the last day counts in full, until midnight, although the pleading can still be filed until three in the afternoon on the next working day. Time limits set in months are counted from date to date. If the last day is a non-working day, the time limit ends on the next working day. The days that do not count Under the “Ley de Enjuiciamiento Civil”, Spain's Civil Procedure Act, the following days are non-working days: Saturdays and Sundays. The whole month of August and the days from 24 December to 6 January, both inclusive. Nationwide public holidays. The public holidays of the autonomous community and those of the locality. In Catalonia, therefore, the region's own holidays set each year by the Generalitat de Catalunya (the Catalan government), such as 11 September, are non-working days. So are the two local holidays of each municipality, such as La Mercè in Barcelona. What counts are the holidays of the place where the court is located, not those of the domicile of the person filing the pleading. If it is a holiday in your municipality but not in the court's, the time limit runs. How they are counted The day of notification does not count. The time limit starts to run on the following day and the last day counts in full, until midnight. For example, if you are notified of a ten-day time limit on a Monday and there are no holidays in between, the first day is the Tuesday and the time limit ends on the Monday two weeks later. Time limits in months or years are counted from date to date. A one-month time limit notified on 10 March ends on 10 April. If the month in which it expires does not have that day, the time limit ends on the last day of the month, so one month counted from 31 January ends on 28 February, or on the 29th in a leap year. For time limits in days as well as in months, if the last day is a non-working day, the time limit ends on the next working day. If a time limit in months runs through August or the Christmas period, it is not clear whether those days are excluded, so the prudent course is not to count on them. The last day The law allows the pleading to be filed until three in the afternoon on the working day after the day on which the time limit expires. It is a margin for the unexpected that is best not relied on. Electronic pleadings can be sent on any day, but those sent on a non-working day are treated as filed on the next working day. These rules are those for court time limits, the ones that start with a notification from the court. Time limits for bringing a claim, such as the limitation period, are counted differently, with every day included.