MO · Small Civil Claims Court
輕微民事案件法庭
The Small Civil Claims Court of the Court of First Instance hears money-debt and consumer claims valued at MOP 100,000 or less; no advance deposit is payable and no lawyer need be appointed — you file a completed form.
What the rules actually say
- What it hears, and the two limits
- Money-debt and consumer claims with a value at or under MOP 100,000. The jurisdiction is limited twice — by value and by subject matter.
- A small dispute of another kind is not brought here at all; it goes to the ordinary civil courts of the Court of First Instance however modest the amount.
- Judiciary澳門特別行政區法院，初級法院
- Do you need a lawyer
- No. A lawyer need not be appointed — 毋須委託律師 — though you may appoint one if you wish.
- This is not the Malaysian or Singaporean rule. There, counsel is prohibited in the equivalent forum. Macau makes representation optional, not unavailable.
- Judiciary澳門特別行政區法院，初級法院
- Advance deposit
- None. Proceedings in this court require no 預付金.
- Together with the form-based filing, this is what makes the court usable without money up front.
- Judiciary澳門特別行政區法院，初級法院
- How you start
- You complete the court’s form and submit it to the Court of First Instance.
- Judiciary澳門特別行政區法院，初級法院
- Administrative disputes go elsewhere
- The Administrative Court is a separate court with jurisdiction over administrative, tax and customs litigation — not the Court of First Instance.
- Judicial appeals against the acts of senior officials are heard by the Court of Second Instance at first instance.
- Statute司法組織綱要法（第9/1999號法律）
What we could not establish
- How the MOP 100,000 ceiling relates to the statutory appeal-interest threshold of the first-instance court. A published judgment describes the court’s jurisdiction as bounded by that threshold, and MOP 50,000 appears in circulation as the figure; the courts’ own current page states MOP 100,000, which is what this guide reports. Which governs a filing today has not been resolved from a primary source.
- The time limit. Macau’s limitation periods come from the Civil Code and vary by the nature of the obligation, so no single period is stated here.
Procedural information, verified 2026-08-16 against the sources cited above. It is not legal advice, and it does not account for the facts of your case. Where two official sources disagree we show both rather than choose for you.
Run your case before you file it
Trial AI puts the dispute above through a full mock trial — a panel of AI judges, both sides argued, a written judgment and a demand letter you can send. Knowing the likely outcome first is what decides whether filing is worth it.