A stricter test still did not bar an amendment adding an appeal on the merits

[3] The appellant is a travel agent that provides travel services for Islamic religious pilgrimages, including the Umrah. The respondents are a family of four, two of whom (namely, the first and fourth respondents) participated in the Umrah organised by the appellant from 26 January 2022 to 8 February 2022.

[4] The respondents, being dissatisfied with the appellant’s services, filed a police report on 16 February 2022 against the appellant, and sent a complaint to six recipients on 18 February 2022. The appellant then commenced claims against the respondents for defamation, malicious falsehood and unlawful interference with trade.

[6] On 22 January 2025, the appellant filed a Notice of Appeal (“Rejected NOA”), which was rejected on 23 January 2025 with the following remarks:

[8] On 11 March 2025, the appellant filed a second Notice of Appeal (“Current NOA”). The Current NOA stated as follows:

[9] On 7 May 2025, the date by which the appellant was to file its Case under O 19 r 17(4) of the ROC, the appellant filed HC/SUM 20002/2025 (“SUM 20002”), seeking an extension of time to file its Case. It then filed its Case on 14 May 2025.

[11] At the hearing for SUM 20002, the court directed that at this stage, the issue of the scope of the appeal, while potentially significant, was not before it and it would leave the parties to consider their position on that and how to proceed.

[12] Accordingly, on 19 August 2025, the appellant filed SUM 20005 to seek leave to amend the Current NOA to include the 3 January Decision, being the District Judge’s decision on the merits.

[13] The appellant’s argument was, in essence, that its intention was always to appeal against both the 3 January Decision and the 25 February Decision. It had indicated as such in the Current NOA, which stated that the appeal was “against the whole of the [District Judge’s] decision”. The amendment sought was therefore merely to correct an inadvertent failure to include the 3 January Decision in the Current NOA. As such, the more stringent standard for applications for extension of time to file an appeal should not apply. The amendment would not seriously prejudice the respondents, as they had notice of its intention to lodge an appeal on the merits from the appellant’s Case, which was filed on 14 May 2025, and had ample time to file their respondents’ Case, which had in any event addressed their substantive arguments.

[15] The main issues were thus:

[18] In considering the applicable standard with which to determine an application to amend a notice of appeal, the court applies the following two-stage framework:

(a) First, the court will consider if the amendment has a material bearing on the merits and outcome of the appeal, such that the amendment application is in essence an application for an extension of time to file a fresh notice of appeal.

(b) Second, assuming that the amendment application is in substance an application for an extension of time to file a notice of appeal, the court then considers whether the amendment and its surrounding circumstances strongly engage the concerns of achieving even-handedness in the context of an adversarial system and thereby warrant the application of the more stringent standard. In so doing, the court will consider the following factors:

(i) whether the amendment raises a new point that was not canvassed previously;

(ii) whether the applicant had sufficient time to consider the filing of a notice of appeal but still filed the one for which the amendment is sought; and

(iii) whether the lower court’s orders were sufficiently distinct and if the applicant decided to file a notice of appeal only with respect to some of those orders despite understanding this.

(See Nail Palace at [20]–[24]).

[19] SUM 20005 was in substance an application for an extension of time to file an appeal as the proposed amendment sought to include an appeal on the District Judge’s decision on merits, which was not included in the Current NOA. Furthermore, the amendment sought and its surrounding circumstances strongly engaged the concerns of finality and achieving even-handedness in the context of an adversarial system, warranting the application of the more stringent standard.

[24] The appellant argued that the more stringent standard should not apply. In relation to the three factors set out in Nail Palace, it argued that:

(a) The proposed amendment was merely to correct a technical issue and did not raise and / or introduce a new point that was not canvassed in the proceedings below.

(b) While the appellant had sufficient time to consider the filing of a notice of appeal, it had inadvertently excluded the 3 January Decision from the Current NOA.

(c) While the District Judge’s decisions were distinct, the rejection remarks provided in relation to the Rejected NOA had indicated to the appellant that the phrase “the whole of the decision” encompassed both the 25 February Decision and the 3 January Decision.

[25] The respondents argued that present application was directly analogous to that in Nail Palace, where the High Court held that the more stringent standard applied:

(a) The proposed amendment in this case, like that in Nail Palace, sought to add into the notice of appeal a decision that was not originally included. This was a substantive expansion of the scope of the appeal from an appeal on the discrete issue of costs to a challenge against the entirety of the substantive judgment.

(b) The appellant had ample time to decide whether to appeal against the 3 January Decision: (i) 44 days until the appeal deadline of 16 February 2025 pursuant to O 19 r 14(1) read with O 19 r 4(1A) of the ROC; and (ii) 67 days until the actual date of filing the Current NOA. This exceeded the 39 days accorded to the appellant in Nail Palace.

(c) Nail Palace involved two distinct orders of court made on separate occasions. Similarly, the present case involved two distinct decisions made on different dates.

[28] Hence, for the reasons above, I found that the circumstances of the application warranted the application of the more stringent standard.

[29] As there were circumstances in this case that showed that the appellant was pursuing an appeal on the merits and that the respondent had been given notice of such at an early stage, I did not think it would be appropriate, even applying the stringent standard, to refuse the application.

[32] The delay of 185 days from 16 February 2025, the deadline for the appellant to file its appeal against the 3 January Decision, to 20 August 2025, which was when the appellant brought SUM 20005, was substantial. However, the delay had to be considered in light of the fact that the respondent was given notice of the appellant’s intention to appeal against the 3 January Decision when the appellant’s Case was filed on 14 May 2025. The imposition of the more stringent standard is based on the principle that a would-be respondent, having been granted a judgment in its favour, should not be kept waiting on tenterhooks to receive the fruits of its judgment: Lee Hsien Loong at [33]. Thus, whether the respondents had prior notice of the appeal was evidently relevant.

[34] In relation to the chances of the appeal succeeding, I did not agree that the appellant had “failed to even articulate coherent grounds of appeal”. The respondents had not provided any elaboration on this point, nor did it expand on such in oral arguments.

[36] Given my findings above, I was of the view that it would be inappropriate to deny the appellant’s appeal on the merits at this juncture.

[39] Subsequently, on 23 September 2025, the respondents wrote in to court, stating that the appellant had failed to comply with this condition. After again seeking to make payment to the respondents’ solicitors, instead of the respondents, and being rebuffed, the appellant had tendered payment of $64,667.01 by cheque to the respondents’ solicitors’ firm at 3.15pm on 22 September 2025. Not only had the appellant completely disregarded the respondents’ request for payment to be made by bank transfer to the second respondent’s account, this payment would not result in receipt of cleared funds by 22 September 2025, as the cheque was delivered only 15 minutes before the 3.30pm cheque-deposit cut-off. More importantly, the cheque sum represented only partial payment of the outstanding sum, as it omitted post-judgment interest accruing until the date of actual payment under O 21 r 29 of the ROC. This was despite correspondence sent by the respondents to the appellant notifying it of the interest then standing on both 18 September 2025 and 22 September 2025, after the receipt of the cheque.

[40] Thus, on 25 September 2025, it was recorded that as the appellant had failed to comply with the stipulations of the order, its appeal stood struck out accordingly.