contract-law foreign-relations
Can we bring a foreign national to court in Australia?
<p>I have a contract violator who is a foreign national. Can I bring him to court in Australia? </p>

<p>The contract was made online. It was just a simple email: will you do this task for me? I will pay you such and such. I agreed and that's it. All through email communication.</p>

<p>Also, if a judgement is made, will he be caught if he enters Australia?</p>

<h2>Yes, but ...</h2>

<p>You can bring a suit in an Australian court of competent jurisdiction. </p>

<p>You would then need to find and serve the defendant in compliance with both Australian law and the law of the jurisdiction they are in. They can then raise a jurisdictional challenge that the Australian court is not the appropriate forum - they might be right depending on where the substance of the contract happened, whether the contract has a nomination of venue clause and if the contract is subject to an arbitration agreement.</p>

<p>If the Australian court decides it does have jurisdiction it would have to decide which law applies - this is likely to be a mix of law because some laws in both jurisdictions are likely not excludable by contract.</p>

<p>If you win, you would then have to get the judgement enforced somewhere  the defendant has assets.</p>

<p>Not paying a judgement is not a crime so the defendant will be of no interest to law enforcement - getting money from them is <em>your</em> problem.</p>

<p><strong>tl;dr</strong></p>

<p>Cross-national litigation is <em>way</em> more expensive in time and money and <em>way</em> less certain in outcome beyond the inherent uncertainty in any lawsuit.</p>

<p>This is not something you can expect to succeed at without lawyers in both countries so you will be spending tens of thousands for an uncertain outcome. If you are chasing millions this may be worth it but if you are - don’t do million dollar deals by email in the future.</p>
