Collecting assets located abroad often begins with filing a lawsuit in U.S. federal courts against persons located abroad. When pursuing this route of asset collection, it is necessary to ensure that summons is properly served on the foreign defendant. Failure to properly serve a foreign defendant can result in delaying collection of the assets, thereby giving the defendant additional time to move those assets out of your reach.

Under Fed. R. Civ. Proc. 4(f) and (h), service of process on a foreign individual or corporation can be accomplished by following the Hague Convention on the Service Abroad of Judicial and Extrajudicial Documents (the "Hague Convention"). The Hague Convention provides various methods for accomplishing service. Although the Hague Convention allows service to be accomplished through a contracting country's designated Central Authority, this method often takes a long time. Article 10 of the Hague Convention does provide faster methods of service such as through postal channels or by transmitting the documents to the appropriate judicial officer (usually the sheriff or his equivalent) of the defendant's country for direct service on the defendant. The key is to ensure that the defendant's country has not objected to the methods of service set forth in Article 10 of the Hague Convention.

Recently, in Ferrostaal, Inc. v. Haci Hassan Yardim, et al., 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 73994 (S.D. N.Y. Sept. 29, 2006), the plaintiff attempted to serve process on two foreign corporations located in Turkey by registered overseas mail pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. Proc. 4(f)(2)(C)(ii). When the defendant corporations objected, the plaintiff argued that service was proper because Article 10(a) of the Hague Convention allowed service to be accomplished by postal channels. What the plaintiff did not realize, however, is that Turkey objected to the provisions of Article 10(a). Thus, the court found that plaintiff's attempted service of process through postal channels was improper.

The lesson from Ferrostaal is to take the time to analyze whether the defendant's country has objected to the alternative methods of service authorized by Article 10 of the Hague Convention. Doing so before the complaint is filed allows you to focus your efforts on collecting the assets, rather than expending time defending against motions to dismiss for improper service of process.