County Court (England and Wales)

The County Court is the national civil court of England and Wales, with unlimited financial jurisdiction. It is a single centrally administered court that sits in many court buildings across the two countries rather than in one place, and the centres where it sits today correspond to the older individual county courts. The modern court was created by the County Courts Act 1846 to give a more coherent and cheaper forum for smaller civil claims than the High Court, and later statutes consolidated it and gave it exclusive jurisdiction over most other inferior courts. Since 2014 England and Wales have had a single civil court of this name. Most cases are decided by a district judge or circuit judge sitting alone without a jury, claims run on small claims, fast and multi tracks by value, and appeals go to a higher judge, the High Court or the Court of Appeal.