How to Fill Out and File the Oregon Acceptance of Service Form

The Oregon Acceptance of Service form is a one-page court document that lets you confirm, in writing, that you received a copy of lawsuit papers, so the other side does not have to pay a sheriff or process server to hand them to you. You can download it for free from the Oregon Judicial Department, fill in the case information and the date you received the documents, check off every paper you were given, sign under penalty of perjury, and file it with the clerk of the circuit court where the case is pending. Once it is filed, service is legally complete and your response clock starts running.¹

What Signing Actually Means

Signing tells the court one thing: you received the listed documents on a specific date. It is not an admission that anything in those documents is true, and it is not a waiver of any defense or right to contest the case. Oregon Law Help puts it plainly — signing means agreeing you got the court documents, not agreeing to what is in them.²

The authority for this shortcut is Oregon Rules of Civil Procedure 7 F(3), which allows proof of service to be made “by written admission of the defendant.”¹ If you refuse to sign, the other party simply hires a process server and comes back; the case moves forward either way. Cooperating saves everyone money without costing you a single legal right.

Where to Get the Form

The Oregon Judicial Department publishes a standardized Acceptance of Service PDF that every circuit court in the state accepts. Download it from courts.oregon.gov/forms.³ Paper copies are also available at the clerk’s office in any county courthouse, and family law packets are collected on the Judicial Department’s family forms page.⁴ The form itself is free.

What to Have in Front of You Before You Start

Pull out the papers you were actually served and work from them. Every detail on the Acceptance of Service has to match the original filing character for character, or the clerk may not be able to link it to your case.

County: the Oregon county where the case was filed.
Case number: the alphanumeric code the clerk assigned when the petition was filed. It appears on every document in the case.
Party names: the full legal names of the Petitioner (or Plaintiff) and Respondent (or Defendant), spelled exactly as on the original.
Document titles: the exact title of each paper you received — Summons, Petition, Complaint, Motion, and so on.

Having the actual documents open in front of you eliminates the most common errors: mismatched titles, misspelled names, and transposed case numbers.

Filling Out the Form

Start at the top with the case header: county, both parties’ names, and the case number. Copy them from the summons or petition.

Check the box showing whether you are the Plaintiff/Petitioner or the Defendant/Respondent. Then enter the date you actually received the papers. Not the date you are signing. Not the date you plan to file. The date the documents came into your hands. That date starts your response deadline, so get it right.

The body of the form lists common documents with checkboxes. Check every one you received:³

Petition
Summons
Claim
Information on mediation
Complaint
Other (write in the title)

In domestic relations cases — divorce, custody, modifications — additional checkboxes appear for family-law specific papers:

Notice of Statutory Restraining Order Preventing Dissipation of Assets
Notice of CIF (Confidential Information Form) Filing
Information on continuation of insurance coverage (COBRA)
Order to Show Cause re: Modification with Motion and Declaration
Statement of Assets and Liabilities
Uniform Support Declaration
Other forms (write in the title)

Check only what you actually received. If you got a document that is not on the printed list, write it in on the “Other” line. Being accurate here prevents arguments later about whether you were properly notified of a particular motion.

Signing the Form

The Acceptance of Service does not need to be notarized. The Oregon Judicial Department’s family-law service guide states this directly.⁵ A declaration under penalty of perjury is built into the form itself. By signing, you affirm: “I hereby declare that the above statements are true to the best of my knowledge and belief. I understand they are made for use in court and I am subject to penalty for perjury.”³

Below your signature, print your name, mailing address, city, state, zip code, and telephone number. The court and the other party will use this address for every future notice in the case, so give one where you reliably receive mail.

Filing the Signed Form

The signed original has to reach the clerk’s office in the county where the case is pending. There is no filing fee for this form. You have three options:

In person: take the original to the clerk’s office at the county courthouse. The clerk date-stamps it; ask for a conformed copy for your records.
By mail: send the original to the clerk’s office, with a self-addressed stamped envelope if you want a stamped copy returned.
Electronically: file through OJD eFile, the Judicial Department’s electronic filing system, which operates in all circuit courts and charges a transaction fee.⁶

Either party can file it. Oregon Law Help notes that the respondent can take the signed form to the court directly, or hand it back to the petitioner to file.⁷ If you are the petitioner and you handed the form back for the other side to file, do not assume it got there. Call the clerk or check the online case record to confirm it was filed.

The 30-Day Clock You Just Started

The date you wrote on the form as the date you received the papers starts a 30-day countdown. Under ORCP 7 C(2), a defendant must respond within 30 days after service.⁸ Responding means filing a motion or an answer with the clerk and serving a copy on the other party. Calling the court or writing a letter is not a response.¹

Miss the 30 days and the other side can ask the court for a default order under ORCP 69, supported by an affidavit showing you were served and did not respond.⁹ If the court grants it, a judgment can follow that gives the other party what they asked for, without your side of the story.

If you need more time, act before the 30 days are up. Ask the other party (or their attorney) for a written stipulation extending the deadline. If they will not agree, file a motion with the court asking for an extension before the original deadline passes.

Mistakes to Avoid

The form is short, but a handful of errors come up again and again:

Wrong date: use the date you actually received the papers, not the date you signed or filed. The receipt date is what triggers your 30 days.
Incomplete document list: if you received six documents and only checked three, service of the other three may be contested. Check every document you were given.
Mismatched case information: copy the county, case number, and party names from the original filing exactly. Small variations can prevent the clerk from linking the form to the case.
Confusing acceptance with agreement: some people refuse to sign because they think it means admitting the other side’s claims. It does not. It only confirms receipt.

If you catch an error after filing — a wrong date, a missed document — contact the clerk’s office about filing a corrected form. The filed date controls your deadline regardless of what actually happened, so fix it rather than hoping it works itself out.

1
Oregon.Public.Law. Oregon Rules of Civil Procedure ORCP 7 – Summons
2
Oregon Law Help. How to Serve Family Court Papers in Oregon
3
Oregon Judicial Department. Acceptance of Service
4
Oregon Judicial Department. Forms for Family Law
5
Oregon Judicial Department. Guide to Serving Legal Papers in Family Law Cases
6
Oregon Judicial Department. OJD eFile
7
Oregon Law Help. How to Serve (Deliver) Your Small Claims Paperwork
8
Oregon State Legislature. Oregon Rules of Civil Procedure – Section: SUMMONS
9
Oregon.Public.Law. Oregon Rules of Civil Procedure ORCP 69 – Default Orders and Judgments