Under the Limitation Act 1980, the time limits for civil claims in England and Wales depend on what kind of claim you are bringing. Six years is the default for contract disputes and most tort claims. Personal injury gets three years. Defamation gets one. Claims on a deed or to recover land get twelve. Miss the deadline that applies to you and the defendant can have the claim struck out no matter how strong its merits.
Deadlines at a Glance
- Simple contract claims: six years from breach (Section 5).1legislation.gov.uk. Limitation Act 1980 – Section 5
- Tort claims (negligence, trespass): six years from when the cause of action accrued (Section 2).2Legislation.gov.uk. Limitation Act 1980 – Section 2
- Sums recoverable under any other statute: six years (Section 9).3Legislation.gov.uk. Limitation Act 1980 – Section 9
- Personal injury: three years from the injury or your date of knowledge, whichever is later (Section 11).4Legislation.gov.uk. Limitation Act 1980 – Section 11
- Fatal accident claims: three years from death or the claimant’s date of knowledge (Section 12).5Legislation.gov.uk. Limitation Act 1980 – Section 12
- Libel and slander: one year from the cause of action, under the Defamation Act 1996.6Legislation.gov.uk. Defamation Act 1996 – Limitation
- Actions on a specialty (deeds): twelve years from accrual (Section 8).7Legislation.gov.uk. Limitation Act 1980 – Section 8
- Actions to recover land: twelve years (Section 15).
- Latent damage (negligence not involving injury): six years from accrual or three years from the date of knowledge, whichever is later, subject to a fifteen-year long-stop (Sections 14A and 14B).8Legislation.gov.uk. Limitation Act 1980 – Section 14A
Once the applicable period expires, the claim is “statute-barred.” The defence is complete and automatic if the defendant chooses to raise it.
When the Clock Actually Starts
The Act repeatedly uses the phrase “from the date on which the cause of action accrued.”2Legislation.gov.uk. Limitation Act 1980 – Section 2 For breach of contract, that is the moment the obligation is broken, even if the loss only becomes apparent years later. For tort claims outside personal injury, it is the date you first suffer actual damage.
Personal injury works differently. Section 14 lets the three-year period run from your “date of knowledge” if that is later than the injury itself. You are treated as knowing enough to start the clock once you know three things: that the injury is significant, that it was caused by the act or omission said to be negligent, and the identity of the defendant.9Legislation.gov.uk. Limitation Act 1980 – Section 14 You do not need to know the conduct was legally negligent. The clock starts on the facts, not on legal advice.
Constructive knowledge counts too. If you could reasonably have found out the key facts by making enquiries or taking expert advice, the law treats you as having known them. Choosing not to look does not extend your time.
Hidden Damage: The Latent Damage Rule and the Fifteen-Year Long-Stop
Some negligence only shows itself years after the work was done. Faulty structural design, bad professional advice, defective surveys. Section 14A gives you two deadlines for non-injury negligence claims and lets you use the later one: six years from accrual, or three years from the date you first had the knowledge needed to sue.8Legislation.gov.uk. Limitation Act 1980 – Section 14A The knowledge test mirrors the personal injury one but applies to property and financial loss.
There is an outer wall, though. Section 14B imposes a fifteen-year long-stop measured from the negligent act itself. Discover the damage in year sixteen and you are out of time, however genuinely hidden it was. This cap exists to protect professionals from claims surfacing decades after their work.
Fraud and Deliberate Concealment
If your claim is based on fraud, or if the defendant has deliberately concealed a fact you need to bring your claim, Section 32 postpones the clock. The limitation period does not begin until you discover the fraud or concealment, or could have discovered it with reasonable diligence.10Legislation.gov.uk. Limitation Act 1980 – Section 32 The same postponement applies to claims for relief from the consequences of a mistake.
Deliberately committing a breach of duty in circumstances where it is unlikely to come to light counts as concealment of the facts of that breach. A builder who covers up defective work cannot later rely on the date the work was done. Unlike the latent damage long-stop, Section 32 has no overriding ceiling. As long as the concealment stays hidden and you have been reasonably diligent, time does not run.
Children and People Who Lack Capacity
Section 28 protects anyone who was “under a disability” when their cause of action arose, which the Act defines as being under eighteen or lacking the mental capacity to conduct proceedings.11Legislation.gov.uk. Limitation Act 1980 – Section 28
The ordinary period does not pause; it is replaced. The person has six years from the date the disability ends (or they die) to bring the claim, even if the normal period has already run. A child injured at ten in a negligence case has until their twenty-fourth birthday. For personal injury specifically, the post-disability window is three years rather than six.
If mental incapacity never lifts, there is no deadline unless a litigation friend brings the claim. Section 28 only helps where the person was already under the disability at the moment the cause of action accrued. If the claim first accrued to someone with full capacity and later passed to someone without, the extension does not apply.
Acknowledging a Debt Resets the Clock
Under Section 29, if a debtor acknowledges the debt in writing or makes a part payment, the limitation period restarts from that date.12Legislation.gov.uk. Limitation Act 1980 – Section 29 This covers debts, other liquidated sums, claims against a deceased person’s estate, and some land recovery situations. Each new acknowledgment or payment can start a fresh period.
One hard rule. Once the claim is already statute-barred, no later acknowledgment or payment can bring it back. The door closes once, and it closes for good. Making small ongoing payments keeps a creditor’s right alive; stopping and waiting out the full period ends it.
Personal Injury: The Court’s Power to Allow a Late Claim
Personal injury is the only category where a judge can override the deadline. Section 33 gives the court discretion to allow a late claim if it would be equitable. The court weighs the length of the delay, the reasons for it, the quality of the evidence that still exists, and how both sides have behaved. The discretion is real but it is not a soft deadline. Courts do not grant Section 33 relief lightly, and there is no equivalent for contract, property, or non-injury tort claims.
Claims With No Deadline
Section 21 removes limitation altogether in two situations involving trustees. A beneficiary can sue a trustee at any time where the claim is based on fraud or a fraudulent breach of trust, or where the beneficiary is recovering trust property (or its proceeds) that is in the trustee’s hands or was previously received by them and converted.13Legislation.gov.uk. Limitation Act 1980 – Section 21 Other breach of trust claims fall back to the standard six-year period.
Meeting the Deadline Means Issuing the Claim
You meet the limitation deadline by actually issuing the claim at court and paying the fee (or applying for fee remission) before midnight on the final day. Fees scale with the value of the claim, from £35 for claims up to £300 through to a flat £10,000 for claims over £200,000.14GOV.UK. Civil Court Fees (EX50) Preparing the paperwork is not enough. A claim filed a day late gives the defendant a complete defence, whatever the merits.