When is a Delaware interlocutory certification response due?

Serve and file the response within ten days after service of the certification application, or within a shorter time required by the trial court. Rule 42 uses Rule 11 computation. For this participant’s service-triggered ordinary period, mail or eFiling adds three days under Rule 11(c).

Responsible actor. The party responding to the trial-court certification application.

Obtain the served certification application.

Identify the effective personal, mail or eFiling service event.

Read any shorter response order or direction for an oral response.

Use the ordinary written-response branch with actual incoming service and its method. Exclude a shorter ordered period and an oral response directed by the trial court.

1. Effective service of the Rule 42 certification application
2. Exclude the established event day and count the stated component under Rule 11(a). Select personal, mail or eFiling service; add Rule 11(c) days to the prescribed participant period before counting.
3. Personal service uses the stated period. Mail and eFiling add three days before final-day treatment.
4. Serve and file the response in the trial court and concurrently deliver its copy to the trial judge. Preserve effective incoming service and the completed outgoing acts.

Rule 11(a) excludes the event day. A prescribed period below seven days excludes intermediate Saturdays, Sundays and legal holidays. Seven days and longer count those intermediate days. A final Saturday, Sunday, legal holiday or actual Clerk closure receives the stated next-open-day treatment. A backward five-day motion component counts earlier eligible days to preserve its required lead. Do not apply the separate Chancery or Superior Court eleven-day threshold.

The 2026 named calendar follows the Court’s published statewide holidays. The 2027 dates are projections of 1 Del. C. § 501 and its fixed-holiday observation rule. December 31, 2027 is the observed New Year holiday for Saturday, January 1, 2028. These dates do not confirm future amendments, Governor or Chief Justice appointments or actual additional closures. Sussex Return Day afternoon is not treated as a statewide full-day Supreme Court closure. Review any actual additional closure separately.

Rule 42(a) directs computation under Supreme Court Rule 11. Rule 11(c) adds three days to a participant’s prescribed service-triggered period for mail or eFiling before final-day treatment. Personal service adds none. Establish effective service under the actual trial court’s procedures. The Supreme Court’s Rule 10 paper procedures do not automatically determine service below. Court acts and entry-based periods receive no participant service addition.

Reviewed coverage uses the retained Supreme Court compilation current through February 2, 2026, for established events on or after that compilation boundary and final dates through December 31, 2027. The index label is not a new effective date for every civil rule. Historical events, backward periods crossing that boundary, later dates, changed orders and actual additional closures require separate review. No computed or paid date is supplied for an input outside that coverage. This boundary does not establish that an actual act is late.

Fictitious example

Fictitious effective personal service, no changed order or actual additional closure. Use the ordinary written-response branch with actual incoming service and its method. Exclude a shorter ordered period and an oral response directed by the trial court.

Fictitious established facts. The example does not establish applicability, actual service, completed filing, an extension, entitlement or a special closure. Use the ordinary written-response branch with actual incoming service and its method. Exclude a shorter ordered period and an oral response directed by the trial court.

Shorter ordered period

Rule 42(c)(ii) allows the trial court to require a shorter response time. The preset does not infer the terms of that order.

Participant service addition

Personal service uses ten days; mail or eFiling uses thirteen before final-day treatment. Court acts do not receive the participant addition.

Concurrent delivery to judge

Rule 42(c)(v) separately requires delivery of the response copy to the trial judge concurrently with service and filing.

Participant service and Court acts

Rule 42(a) directs computation under Supreme Court Rule 11. Rule 11(c) adds three days to a participant’s prescribed service-triggered period for mail or eFiling before final-day treatment. Personal service adds none. Establish effective service under the actual trial court’s procedures. The Supreme Court’s Rule 10 paper procedures do not automatically determine service below. Court acts and entry-based periods receive no participant service addition.

Compilation and calendar coverage

Reviewed coverage uses the retained Supreme Court compilation current through February 2, 2026, for established events on or after that compilation boundary and final dates through December 31, 2027. The index label is not a new effective date for every civil rule. Historical events, backward periods crossing that boundary, later dates, changed orders and actual additional closures require separate review. No computed or paid date is supplied for an input outside that coverage. This boundary does not establish that an actual act is late.

• Use the ordinary written-response branch with actual incoming service and its method. Exclude a shorter ordered period and an oral response directed by the trial court.
• The stated component does not obtain an extension, establish completed acts or decide an excluded procedural branch.

• Obtain the served certification application.
• Identify the effective personal, mail or eFiling service event.
• Read any shorter response order or direction for an oral response.
• Rule 42(c)(ii) allows the trial court to require a shorter response time. The preset does not infer the terms of that order.
• Personal service uses ten days; mail or eFiling uses thirteen before final-day treatment. Court acts do not receive the participant addition.
• Rule 42(c)(v) separately requires delivery of the response copy to the trial judge concurrently with service and filing.
• This act belongs in the trial court. Rule 42(c)(v) requires concurrent delivery of the application or response copy to the trial judge, in addition to service and filing. Establish the actual trial court’s electronic or paper cutoff, time zone, service procedure, case order and completed receipts. The Supreme Court’s 5 p.m. ordinary eFiling cutoff does not automatically govern a filing below.