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Refusing the documents does not stop them being served. If a process server tells you what the documents are and leaves them with you, at your feet, or as near to you as they reasonably can, personal service has taken place, and the court deadlines inside start running whether or not you ever pick them up. The refusal itself is recorded and forms part of the evidence of service.
It feels intuitive that papers you never touched cannot count against you. The law takes the opposite view, for an obvious reason: if refusal defeated service, no one would ever be served with anything unwelcome.
Personal service means leaving the document with the person to be served. The courts settled long ago that where someone declines to take a document, it is sufficient for the server to explain what the document is and leave it in their presence or control, on the doorstep, at their feet, tucked under an arm or a windscreen wiper if that is what the moment allows. From that point the person is served. The deemed service rules then fix the official date, and every deadline in the document, to acknowledge, to respond, to comply with an order, runs from it.
A refusal changes the paperwork, not the outcome. The server notes the time, place, what was said, how the person was identified and exactly where the documents were left, and that account goes into the certificate or affidavit of service. If the matter later reaches a judge, a documented refusal tends to read poorly for the person who refused, and it strengthens any subsequent application the other side makes about service.
Take the documents. Accepting them concedes nothing: it is not an admission, an agreement or a signature on anything. What it does is start you on the front foot, with the full response period available and the contents in your hands rather than on your driveway. Then read them the same day and take advice promptly, because the most expensive mistake in litigation is the deadline that passed while the envelope sat unopened.
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This page provides general information about the law and practice in England and Wales and is not legal advice. Rules change and individual circumstances vary; always take advice from a solicitor on your specific situation. Prices shown are indicative, exclusive of VAT and confirmed in writing before any work begins.