When a party or interested person appoints or changes a representative or agent, who must tell the administrative agency, and from when does the duty to do so run?
General information · Not legal advice
Material to check
In a practice file we read the paper by which the party or interested person selected or appointed the representative or agent, any later paper changing or dismissing that person, and any notice or receipt held by the administrative agency showing when it learned of the fact.
These are types of material to look for, not evidence already verified by PRO SE.
Where readings differ
One reading places the duty on the party or interested person: having selected or appointed a representative or agent, that person must notify the administrative agency without delay, and the same duty to notify without delay arises again when the representative or agent is changed or dismissed, save that where the hearing officer has permitted the agent's appointment under the provision that empowers the hearing officer to permit the appointment of an agent, it is the hearing officer who must notify the administrative agency of that fact.
Another reading notes that the provision fixes no form or content for the notice, only that it be given without delay from the event, so the file must show the date of the appointment, change or dismissal and the date the agency received word of it, and the provision does not say how the gap between them is to be judged.
Your judgment
If the notice reached the agency long after the appointment was made, what in the file would show whether the delay was avoidable?
PRO SE does not make this decision or keep a case record on this public site.When to reconsider
We look at this again if the provision is amended to prescribe the form or content of the notice, or if a decision explains how the period set by the words without delay is measured.