|
Texas Office of Court Administration and |
Electronic Filing Project |
|
Judicial Committee on Information Technology |
White Paper: Frequently Asked Questions |
The EFM
will be “open for business” 24 hours a day, seven days a week which means
that filers could submit documents at any time, except during planned
maintenance periods. The date in
which the documents are filed, however, remains in the purview of the courts as
specified by local or state rules. In
consideration of filers outside of the county it is important that local rules
be posted.
After a filer has submitted a document to the court, there are several actions that can be taken by the court. If the clerk chooses to accept the filing it will be electronically stamped and the EFM will send a receipt to the EFSP. If the clerk declines the document, the reason for the declination will be returned to the EFSP Responses are carried through the JCIT approved court filing standard confirmation envelope that is sent to the EFSP by the EFM. The EFSP then sends the appropriate message to the filer via an e-mail or EFSP inbox letter.
TexasOnline system reliability is 98.5% at this time. The JCIT is developing recommended State and local rules to govern e-Filing liability in the event that a system failure is sustained. There are three potential points of failure within the system:
EFSP transmission to EFM – Until the EFM receipt is received, the Filer will bear the responsibility to complete filing.
EFM transmission to CMS – The EFM is responsible to ensure the transfer of data is successful and the clerk is responsible to ensure that the load into the CMS is successful.
EFM response to EFSP –The EFM bears the responsibility to ensure that responses are transmitted back to the correct EFSP.
EFSP response to Filer - The EFSP bears the responsibility to ensure that responses are transmitted back to the filer.