Most foreigners who are sued in Korea do not know it has happened until the money is gone. A bank account is frozen, or a salary arrives short, and the trail leads back to a judgment entered months earlier in a case they never attended. In almost every one of those files, an envelope arrived first and was misread as a bill, a notice, or junk.
Korean civil procedure is not hostile to defendants. It is simply unforgiving about deadlines, and it does not pause because the papers were in a language you do not read. What follows is what each envelope actually is, what the clock on it is, and what happens to people who let it run out.
→Three Envelopes, Three Different Clocks
Being sued in Korea does not always start with a lawsuit. Creditors have cheaper routes, and the cheap routes are the ones foreigners meet most often — a landlord chasing repair costs, a former employer claiming a training bond, a lender or a card company, a shop or clinic with an unpaid balance.
- Payment order (지급명령) — a summary procedure. The creditor applies, the court issues the order without a hearing and without ever hearing from you, and it is served. There is no trial unless you create one
- Performance recommendation decision (이행권고결정) — used in small claims cases (소액사건). The court reads the complaint and recommends that you pay, again without a hearing
- Complaint (소장) — an ordinary lawsuit. This one is a real case from the start, with hearing dates and a judgment at the end
The first two are designed to produce a binding result quickly when the debtor does nothing. That design is the trap. A payment order that is not objected to has the practical force of a judgment, and it gets there in weeks rather than the year an ordinary case would take.
| Document | Your Deadline | If You Do Nothing |
|---|---|---|
| Payment order (지급명령) | Objection (이의신청) within two weeks of service | It becomes final and enforceable — enforcement can follow without any trial |
| Performance recommendation decision (이행권고결정) | Objection within two weeks of service | It takes effect and can be enforced like a judgment |
| Complaint (소장) | Answer (답변서) within thirty days of service | The court may give judgment on the papers alone, without a hearing |
| Judgment (판결) | Appeal (항소) within two weeks of receiving the judgment | It becomes final; the debt is fixed and enforceable for years |
Every one of those periods runs from service, not from the date printed on the document, and not from the day you understood it. That distinction decides more cases than any argument about the merits.
→The Objection Is Not a Defence. It Is a Door.
People hesitate over the objection to a payment order (지급명령) because they think it commits them to something, or because they want to write out the whole story first and have not had time to translate it. Neither concern survives contact with what the objection actually is.
An objection does not have to prove anything. It does not have to set out your defence, attach evidence, or explain why the claim is wrong. Its only function is to convert the summary procedure into an ordinary lawsuit, where you will then have the chance to file a proper answer and be heard. A one-page objection filed on day thirteen preserves everything. A brilliant twenty-page rebuttal filed on day fifteen preserves nothing.
File the objection first and argue later. The deadline is the case; the merits are only the case if the deadline is met.
The same is true of the small-claims performance recommendation decision (이행권고결정) on its two-week clock. Object within the period and the matter proceeds as a normal small case; miss it, and a decision you never contested starts behaving like a judgment.
→If It Is a Complaint: The Answer (답변서) and the Judgment Without a Hearing
Where a real complaint (소장) has been served, the thirty-day period to file an answer (답변서) is not a suggestion. If nothing is filed and the claim is otherwise in order, the court may decide the case on the pleadings alone — a judgment without oral argument (무변론판결) — and the first hearing you were waiting for never happens.
An answer does not need to be elegant, but it should do four things:
- State clearly that the claim is contested, in whole or in part. Silence on a factual allegation is read as acceptance of it, so go through the complaint point by point and say what you admit and what you deny
- Give your version, briefly. Detail can follow in later briefs (준비서면); the answer exists to stop the case being decided without you
- Raise anything that defeats the claim outright — payment already made, a settlement, the wrong defendant, or expiry of the limitation period. These are lost if never raised
- Give an address that works. Everything after this is served on you, and a defendant who moves without telling the court effectively drops out of the case
Korean civil cases are conducted in Korean, and documents in a foreign language are filed with a translation. Interpretation is arranged for hearings where a party does not speak Korean, and the courts operate an electronic filing system that most represented parties use. Where the cost of counsel is the obstacle, there is a litigation aid scheme (소송구조) under which a court may relieve a party of filing fees and, in defined circumstances, appoint counsel — it is applied for, and it is not automatic.
→"I Never Received Anything"
This is the situation I am asked about most, and it is not hopeless — but it depends entirely on what the court's service record shows.
Ordinary service goes by post to your registered address. Where that fails repeatedly, a creditor can ask for special service (특별송달) through a court officer, including in the evening or at a weekend, and, if the defendant genuinely cannot be located, for service by publication (공시송달) — a method under which the papers are treated as served after a period, whether or not anyone has actually seen them. Cases are won and lost this way: the defendant had moved, the address on file was the old landlord's, and a judgment was entered against a person who never knew a case existed.
The remedy is a late appeal (추후보완항소). Where a party failed to meet a deadline for a reason not attributable to their own fault — the classic case being service by publication that never reached them — the appeal may be filed within a short period after the obstacle disappears, counted from when the party actually learned of the judgment, with a longer period for a party residing abroad. What that means practically:
- The clock starts when you find out, and "finding out" includes the day your account was frozen or your wages were attached. Do not spend three weeks gathering documents first
- You must show it was not your fault. Not having reported an address change is a problem; not having received papers sent to an address you had properly reported is not
- Get the case record. The service report in the file states how, where, and to whom delivery was made or attempted. That document decides the point far more than your account of it
→After Judgment: What They Can Actually Take
A final judgment, a finalised payment order, or an effective performance recommendation decision all produce the same thing — a title on which enforcement can proceed. In practice that means attachment of bank deposits, attachment of a portion of salary paid by an employer in Korea, and seizure of movable property. Statutory floors protect a minimum amount of wages and certain essential household items, but they are floors, not shields.
Two further mechanisms exist for creditors who cannot find assets: a court order requiring the debtor to list their property under oath (재산명시), and a court-run search of financial and registry records (재산조회). Failing to comply with the first has consequences of its own, and continued non-payment can lead to registration on the list of defaulting debtors (채무불이행자명부), which is visible to financial institutions.
The time limit is the part people underestimate. A claim confirmed by a final judgment is enforceable for ten years — and a creditor can renew it before that period expires. Leaving Korea does not extinguish it. Assets and income here remain reachable, and the record is waiting if you return, apply for a visa change, or later want to buy property or borrow.
Three things worth doing on the day the envelope arrives
First, photograph the envelope, not just the papers — the delivery slip carries the service date, and that date is the start of every period that matters. Second, find the case number (사건번호) on the first page and keep it; everything about the file is retrievable with it. Third, do not sign or pay anything handed to you by someone who arrives at your door claiming to be from the creditor. A court communicates by service, and an admission or a part-payment made to stop the pressure can be produced later as an acknowledgment of the whole debt.
If the claim is genuinely owed, none of this is wasted effort — a defended case is the setting in which a schedule of payment or a reduced settlement gets agreed. What cannot be repaired is the case decided in silence.