Organising Your Evidence for a Small Claims Tribunal

Small claims tribunals across Australia — NCAT in New South Wales, VCAT in Victoria, QCAT in Queensland, SAT in Western Australia, SACAT in South Australia, ACAT in the Australian Capital Territory, NTCAT in the Northern Territory, and the Magistrates Court of Tasmania — are designed for self-represented parties. That does not mean evidence is optional. It means the tribunal expects you to do the organising yourself, and judges your case on whether you have done so well.

The evidence pyramid

Every well-organised small claims case has the same shape. At the base sit the raw documents — contracts, invoices, photographs, text messages, emails. Above them sits a chronology — a single page listing every relevant event with the date and the document reference. Above that sits the witness statement — your first-person narrative tying the documents together. At the top sits the hearing bundle — the paginated, indexed compilation handed to the tribunal member.

The simple system that works

• One folder per case — physical or digital, never mixed
• Sub-folders by category — contract, invoices, communications, photographs, demands
• Date every file name — “2026-03-14 invoice 1042.pdf” sorts itself chronologically
• One chronology document — table format, dates in column 1, event in column 2, document reference in column 3
• Print three copies for the hearing — one for you, one for the other side, one for the member

Common pitfalls

Three habits lose small claims hearings. Bringing a phone full of screenshots — the tribunal member cannot mark, refer back to, or rely on evidence that lives only on a screen. Unsorted documents — handing the member a stack of unsorted papers tells them you cannot prove what you assert. Missing originals — for many disputes (especially handwritten contracts and signed documents), the original needs to be available for inspection.

What the witness statement does

The witness statement is the document that pulls everything together. It walks the member through your chronology in numbered paragraphs, exhibits each document at the right moment, and gives the member a single readable narrative. Without it, the evidence is a pile. With it, the evidence is a case.

What Claim Done delivers

For a flat fee, Claim Done drafts your witness statement from your answers (in New South Wales, a witness statement outline you complete in your own words).

What happens after

Once the witness statement is filed and served under directions, the next step is a Hearing Bundle for the hearing day: a chronology, statement of issues, evidence index, position statement and draft orders, as separate PDFs — also a flat-fee Claim Done service.