What is Required for Asserting an Objection to a Request for Documents under the Amended Florida Rules of Civil Procedure?

Effective January 1, 2025, the Florida Supreme Court adopted significant amendments to various rules in the Florida Rules of Civil Procedure, including Rule 1.350, which governs requests for documents from a party. The key changes to Rule 1.350 include:

• The grounds for an objection to a document request must state “with specificity” and “include the reasons” for the objections. This means that boilerplate or general objections are no longer permitted.
• The objection must state whether any responsive materials are being withheld from production because of the objection.
• An objection to part of a request for production must specify the part of the request to which the objection is asserted and produce the documents to the balance of the request to which there is no objection.

Amended Rule 1.350 now aligns with the Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 34, which requires that objections to be stated with specificity, including the reasons for the objection.  Any grounds not specifically stated are considered waived.  Previously, there was less emphasis on specificity which led to broader and less informative objections and made it unclear whether responsive documents were being withheld.

In addition, that amended Rule 1.350 now requires clarity on whether responsive materials are being withheld because of an objection also aligns the rule with Federal Rule 34. This will also help conserve resources that are often wasted where a moving party moves to overrule objections only to discover after the fact that the responding party was not withholding documents.

Amended Rule 1.350 also borrows from Federal Rule 34 in requiring an objection to part of a request to specify the part of the request to which there is an objection and to permit production of documents to the part of the request to which there is no objection.

Another important change under the amended version of Rule 1.350 is that the amended rule requires the responding party to assert specific facts and/or the legal basis for the objection instead of that party merely stating a conclusory objection without explanation, e.g., the request is unduly burdensome. The goal of this requirement is to make more transparent the grounds for the objection and whether there are documents available if the court were to overrule the responding party’s objections.