Jurisdiction(s):
United Kingdom

Key definition

Accident definition

What does Accident mean? In legal practice, an accident describes a sudden, unintended and unexpected event that causes personal injury, death or property damage. The term is descriptive and used across personal injury (negligence, employers’ liability, public liability), insurance and health and safety law; its precise scope depends on context and any applicable statute or policy wording. In road traffic cases, legislation imposes duties following an accident (for Great Britain, see Road Traffic Act 1988, s.170; Northern Ireland has equivalent provisions; Ireland’s Road Traffic Acts contain similar duties). In workplace health and safety, reporting regimes refer to accidents (for example, RIDDOR in Great Britain and...

Slip rule (CPR 40.12, England and Wales): correcting accidental errors in judgments and orders: scope, limitations and application procedure

Published by a LexisNexis Dispute Resolution expert

Practice notes

This Practice Note addresses the correction of accidental slips or omissions in judgments or orders under cpr 40.12, outlining when the rule can, and cannot, be invoked and the approach to making an application.

What is the slip rule?

The slip rule is the mechanism by which the court may amend an accidental slip or omission in a judgment or order (see CPR 40.12; CPR PD 40B, para 4.1 and CPR PD 40B, para 4.5).

CPR 40.12 provides that the court may at any time correct an accidental slip or omission in a judgment or order.

The phrase ‘any time’ needs no further gloss or explanation and means exactly what it says: the jurisdiction is not limited to orders that are still in existence (IC v RC—while a family case, it considered an identical provision to CPR 40.12 in the family procedure rules).

This jurisdiction is restricted to genuine slips or omissions—the operative word is ‘accidental’—in the text of a sealed court order or a handed-down judgment. It cannot be used to correct substantive errors, for example a mistake of law...

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Web page updated on 21/05/2026

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