By Neta, founder of SortMyDivorce · Updated
Most documents in a family case ask you to do something. A Request to Admit is the one that does something to you if you do nothing. It is a numbered list of facts and documents, and the form says on its face that if you do not respond within 20 days, the case goes to court on the basis that you have admitted every one of them. This guide is for Ontario. Form 22 and the 20-day deemed admission are Ontario Family Law Rules procedure. The United States equivalent, a request for admission under Federal Rule 36 or its state counterparts, works on a similar principle with a 30-day period; it is covered at the end. Other provinces have their own admission procedures with their own periods.
| What it is | Form 22, a list of facts you are asked to admit are true and documents you are asked to admit are genuine, "only for the purposes of this case." |
|---|---|
| Your deadline | The form's own capitals: "YOU MUST RESPOND TO THIS REQUEST WITHIN 20 DAYS AFTER BEING SERVED WITH IT." |
| If you do not respond | Also on the form: the case "will go to court on the basis that you are admitting, for the purpose of this case only, that the facts set out below are true and that the documents described below are genuine." |
| How you respond | By serving a Response to Request to Admit, Form 22A, which the sender is supposed to attach in blank. |
| What a response says | For each numbered item: admit, deny, or refuse to admit with reasons. |
| What "genuine" means | That an original was written, signed or sealed as it appears; that a copy is a true copy; and that a letter or email was sent and received as it appears. |
| Governing rule | Rule 22 of the Family Law Rules, O. Reg. 114/99. |
| US equivalent | Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 36: "A matter is admitted unless, within 30 days after being served," a written answer or objection is served. |
Keeping track of dates like these across a stack of letters is exactly what SortMyDivorce does — start a free trial, no card needed.
Trials are expensive because everything has to be proved. A Request to Admit exists to take the undisputed things off the table before anyone pays to prove them: the date of marriage, the date of separation, that a particular bank statement is what it says it is, that an email was sent on the date it shows.
Used properly it saves both sides money. Used tactically, it is a way of getting the other party to admit a contested fact by default, because the deadline passed while the document sat in a pile.
The form has two lists. The first, on page one, is facts: "You are requested to admit, only for the purposes of this case, that the following facts are true." The second, on page two, is documents: "You are requested to admit, only for the purposes of this case, that the following documents are genuine." Each item is numbered, and your response refers to those numbers.
The Request to Admit carries its own warning, in capitals, immediately after the name of the party it is addressed to:
"YOU MUST RESPOND TO THIS REQUEST WITHIN 20 DAYS AFTER BEING SERVED WITH IT."
"IF YOU DO NOT RESPOND WITHIN THE TIME GIVEN, THIS CASE WILL GO TO COURT ON THE BASIS THAT YOU ARE ADMITTING, FOR THE PURPOSE OF THIS CASE ONLY, THAT THE FACTS SET OUT BELOW ARE TRUE AND THAT THE DOCUMENTS DESCRIBED BELOW ARE GENUINE."
Two features of this deserve attention.
It is 20 days, not 30. The Answer to an Application is 30 days. Most correspondence deadlines in a family case are set by lawyers and are negotiable. This one is shorter than the others and is set by the form.
The consequence is automatic in its framing. The form does not say the other side may ask the court to treat the facts as admitted. It says the case will go to court on the basis that you are admitting them. Undoing a deemed admission afterwards means asking the court for permission to withdraw it, and you would be doing that as the person who let the period lapse.
Page two of the form defines the word, and the definition is what makes the document list dangerous to ignore. Admitting a document is genuine also means admitting:
"that a document that claims to be an original was written, signed or sealed as it appears to have been;". "that a document claiming to be a copy is a true copy of the original; and". "where the document claims to be a copy of a letter, fax, electronic-mail message or other document ordinarily sent from one person to another, that it was sent as it appears to have been sent and received by the person to whom it was addressed.".
So a Request to Admit that lists "email from the respondent dated 14 March" is asking you to admit not just that the email exists but that you sent it, on that date, and that it was received. If there is any dispute about whether a document is what the other side says it is, this is the moment to say so.
The response is Form 22A, and the sender is supposed to attach a blank one. The form says: "If the blank form is missing, contact your own lawyer or the court office as soon as possible." A missing form does not extend the 20 days.
Form 22A is a short document with five numbered statements, each referring back to the numbering in the Request:
1. "I admit that the following facts are true:" (fact numbers) 2. "I admit that the following documents are genuine:" (document numbers) 3. "I deny that the following facts are true:" (fact numbers) 4. "I deny that the following documents are genuine:" (document numbers) 5. "I refuse to admit the following facts for the following reasons:" with a space for the fact number and your reasons.
The structure tells you how to work through the Request. Every item lands in exactly one of three places: admitted, denied, or refused with reasons. There is no fourth category for "I am not sure," and an item you do not mention at all risks being treated as admitted.
Admit what is true. Admitting the date of your marriage costs you nothing and makes you look reasonable. Refusing to admit things that are plainly true is the kind of conduct courts notice.
Deny what is false. A denial should be a real one, about a fact you say is wrong.
Refuse, with reasons, where you genuinely cannot say. A fact about the other party's finances that you have no way of verifying is a refusal, and the reason is that you do not have the information. Write the reason; the form asks for it.
Serve it inside the 20 days and keep proof. The Request is served on you; the Response is served on them. Note the date you were served, count 20 days, and serve before that date with a record of how and when.
Readers in the United States will recognise the mechanism. Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 36 allows a party to serve "a written request to admit, for purposes of the pending action only, the truth of any matters within the scope of Rule 26(b)(1) relating to: (A) facts, the application of law to fact, or opinions about either; and (B) the genuineness of any described documents."
The period is 30 days rather than 20, and the consequence is the same in substance: "A matter is admitted unless, within 30 days after being served, the party to whom the request is directed serves on the requesting party a written answer or objection addressed to the matter and signed by the party or its attorney."
Rule 36 also spells out what a proper denial looks like, which is useful guidance even in Ontario: "A denial must fairly respond to the substance of the matter; and when good faith requires that a party qualify an answer or deny only a part of a matter, the answer must specify the part admitted and qualify or deny the rest." Lack of knowledge is an acceptable reason for not admitting only if the party "states that it has made reasonable inquiry and that the information it knows or can readily obtain is insufficient to enable it to admit or deny."
Family cases in the United States run under state rules, not the federal ones, but most state discovery rules on requests for admission are modelled on Rule 36 and carry the same deemed-admission consequence. The period varies by state; treat 30 days as the common figure and confirm yours.
Note the date and method of service. The 20 days run from it.
Count 20 days forward and put the date somewhere you will see it. This is the shortest fixed deadline you are likely to meet in the case.
Check that a blank Form 22A was attached. If not, get one from your lawyer or the court office the same day.
Go through every numbered item and sort it into admit, deny, or refuse with reasons. Do the documents list with the definition of "genuine" in front of you.
Send the sorted list to your lawyer with the Request. A Response to Request to Admit is short, and a lawyer can turn a sorted list into a served Form 22A quickly. An unsorted Request with a week left is a different job.
Serve the Response and keep the proof. A response served on day 21 is not a response.
Verification note. The text of Rule 22 itself could not be read from e-Laws in this pass, because that site now renders only in a browser. The deadline and the consequence on this page are taken from the prescribed form, which states both on its face. What this page therefore does not cover: the rule's own provisions on withdrawing an admission, and any cost consequence the rule attaches to an unreasonable refusal to admit. Both exist in some form in Ontario civil and family practice; ask your lawyer about them rather than relying on this page for either. The forms reviewed are marked 2005/09; check Ontario Court Services for a current version before using them.
Twenty days after service is what the form states, and the deemed-admission consequence is attached to it. Time can be extended by agreement or by the court, but an extension is something you obtain, in writing, before the period runs, not something you assume.
Admit the thirteen and deny or refuse the two, by number, on Form 22A. The form is designed for exactly that. Admitting what is true is not a concession; it is how the process is supposed to work.
That the admission is used in this proceeding and is not a general statement to the world. It is still binding within the case, which is where it matters.
Do not admit it as genuine. The definition of "genuine" includes that the email "was sent as it appears to have been sent." If you cannot say that, deny or refuse with reasons, and say why. Then find the email in your own records before the next step.
The form says the case goes to court on the basis that you have admitted every fact and every document. Withdrawing a deemed admission requires the court's permission and is not automatic. If the period has already run, get a lawyer involved immediately rather than serving a late response and hoping.
The same idea. Federal Rule 36, and the state rules modelled on it, deem a matter admitted unless a written answer or objection is served within 30 days. Ontario's period is 20 days, and the Ontario form does not provide for objections in the Rule 36 sense; it provides for refusal with reasons.
Last reviewed September 2026. Researched and written by Neta, founder of SortMyDivorce. I am not a lawyer and this is not legal advice — laws, fees and forms change, so please confirm current details with the official sources above or a local family lawyer.
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