5.  The applicants were born in 1976 and 1982 and live in Khust and Kharkiv respectively. 6.  The first applicant lodged a claim against a social security authority, seeking an increase in the amount of child allowance she was receiving. A first-instance court allowed her claim in part. That judgment was upheld on appeal but the social security authority lodged a further appeal on points of law. 7.  On 6 November 2012 the Higher Administrative Court (“the HAC”), having examined the appeal, quashed the lower courts’ judgments and dismissed the applicant’s claim. 8.  The second applicant moved from the territory of the Republic of Moldova controlled by the so‑called “Moldavian Republic of Transdniestria” (“MRT”) (see Ilaşcu and Others v. Moldova and Russia [GC], no. 48787/99, ECHR 2004‑VII) to Ukraine to take up permanent residence. Under domestic law, repatriating Ukrainians were entitled to the tax-free and duty-free import of their foreign-registered vehicles. However, the customs office refused to apply this tax exemption in the applicant’s case on the grounds that the car had not been registered by the appropriate authorities of the Republic of Moldova. She challenged this refusal before the administrative courts. A first-instance court allowed her claim and ordered the customs office to clear her car through customs. That judgment was upheld on appeal but the customs office lodged a further appeal on points of law. 9.  On 4 April 2013 the HAC allowed the appeal, quashed the lower courts’ decisions and dismissed the applicant’s claim. 10.  Both applicants alleged that the HAC, contrary to domestic law (see paragraph 11 below), had not sent them copies of the appeals lodged in their cases or informed them of the pending appeals by any other means, thus depriving them of an opportunity to respond. They alleged that they had only learned of the appeal proceedings when they had been served with the HAC’s final decisions quashing the lower courts’ decisions in their favour. 11.  As worded at the relevant time, Articles 214 and 215 of the 2005 Code of Administrative Justice provided that a HAC judge-rapporteur would decide, having considered an appeal, whether to initiate proceedings to review the lower courts’ decisions on points of law. If the judge decided to initiate such proceedings, he or she was required to inform the parties of that decision and serve a copy of the appeal on the opposing party with a time-limit for responding. 12.  The relevant provisions of the Code concerning the procedure for serving court documents are summarised in Lazarenko and Others v. Ukraine (nos. 70329/12 and 5 others, § 15, 27 June 2017).