Beijing courts make judges more accessible

Beijing courts have diversified the ways litigants can contact judges to provide better legal services to the public.

According to a statement issued by Beijing High People's Court on Nov 20, litigants and attorneys can now reach judges through legal service center, website, hotline and WeChat account of the capital's courts to know their litigation process and information they need in a timely manner.

The move is to prevent litigants' questions from being ignored when their judges are busy hearing a case or out investigating, said Cai Huiyong, spokesman of the high people's court, adding that it will ensure better communication between the courts and the people.

To deal with the problem, the capital city's high people's court opened a 24-hour hotline and established a channel via its website and WeChat earlier this year, as well as ordered courts across the city to set up self-service platform in their legal service centers, he said.

"Thanks to the online measures, litigants can leave text, voice or even audio messages to judges," he said. "Judges have also been ordered to respond within a prescribed time. If a judge is late to give a feedback, he or she will receive a warning from the platform."

"Our aim is to ensure every litigant's question or request can be responded as soon as possible," he added.

From January to October, the capital's courts received 37,682 messages from litigants, among which more than 20,000 were collected via website and WeChat, the statement said, adding more than 96 percent of the messages received feedback.