In most counties you can ask the court clerk so serve the defendant by certified mail. If you want the defendant served by certified mail you must pay the court clerk for the cost of mailing. If you win your case, the judge will order the defendant to pay you for the cost of mailing. The defendant must sign the return receipt to receive the mail. The post office will mail the signed receipt back to the court clerk.
Service of process is complete when the court clerk receives the receipt signed by the defendant.
If the clerk does not receive the receipt signed by the defendant, you will have to try a different way to serve process. Service of process by certified mail costs less than service by the sheriff s office or by a private process server but is more often not completed because the defendant does not sign the receipt. If you want to serve process by certified mail, you must mark the appropriate space near the bottom of your claim. You should call the court clerk s office a couple of weeks after you filed your claim and ask whether the return receipt has been signed by the defendant. If you call a couple of weeks after you filed the claim and service of process has not been completed, you will still have a couple of weeks to try a different method to serve process.