The MC12 was revised again and dated 6/13 to comply with a new change to court rules that will allow 182 days for service on the garnishee.  The new rule will extend that time for service for all garnishments – periodic (MC12), nonperiodic (MC13) and tax (MC52).  Since that time for service is not mentioned on the MC52 it did not need revision.  The MC13 was also just revised in similar fashion to the MC12 and now with a revision date of 1/14 .  For both the MC12 and MC13 you will be able to use up the previous revision (dated 10/12 for MC12 and 4/12 for MC13) with a simple hand correction until stock is depleted (see our note below**).  

Here are more details.  Last year in October the MC12 was revised to accommodate a new change to the law, MCL600.4012(1), that allowed the duration of a wage garnishment to last up to 182 days, up from the previous 91 days.  Note that law only applied to wages (salary or earnings).  At that time Michigan Court Rules were also changed that allowed the duration of a periodic garnishment to be 182 days for any kind of periodic garnishment, not just wages. This was done in MCR3.101(B)(1)(a)(ii).  In that same rule, section (E)(2) the date of service was extended to 182 days after issue for any writ of garnishment (including tax and non-periodic garnishments) but unfortunately in section (F)(1) there was also a reference to the time for service that was left at 91 days.  Due to the conflict between the rules in sections (E) and (F), essentially the shorter 91 days for service remained if effect for any type of garnishment.  Because of that the 10/12 revision of MC12 kept the reference to the time for service at 91 days in the note “TO THE PLAINTIFF” about mid way down the form.   At the bottom of the form in item 5, where it previously had said the duration of the periodic garnishment was 91 days, it was changed to read simply “the expiration date”.  

         Well this reference to 91 days for service in the middle of the form (with no reference to 182 days anywhere on the form) caused much confusion with court clerks and plaintiffs thinking that the 10/12 revision was still limited to 91 days.  Only the time to serve the writ on the garnishee was still limited to 91 days and that only because of a conflict in the two sections of the court rules.   However this was destined to be temporary because in theory as long as your garnishment is still effective (182 days) you should still be able to serve it.  So the court eventually changed section (F)(1) from 91 days to 182 days so that it is consistent with section (E)(2) of  MCR3.101.  That change resulted in the new 6/13 revision of MC12. 

To continue to use up the existing 10/12 revision of MC12 or the 4/12 revision of MC13, simply change 91 to 182 days in the “TO THE PLAINTIFF” section about mid-way down on either form.

**(One would not think you would not even need to correct it if you served it before 91 days which would almost always be the case with periodic garnishments but such logic may escape some courts so we advise you to check if the clerks expect the correction regardless of when it is served).

         The court did not want complicated rules where the service time for one type of garnishment was different from another so this new rule change extended the time for service to 182 days for all types of garnishments, including MC13, non-periodic garnishments and MC52 the tax garnishment.  The longer time for MC52 is big news because this will help large collection firms by allowing a much longer window to file in the court and still get them served on the Treasury within this longer 182 day timeframe.