Rule Text
(a) A party who is without financial resources may seek or obtain a waiver of certain fees and costs pursuant to Pa.R.J.A. 1990.
(b) Dismissal for Frivolous Action. Nothing in Pa.R.J.A. 1990 shall preclude the court from sua sponte dismissing an underlying action, which is filed contemporaneously with an application to waive fees and costs, as frivolous.
Amendment history: The provisions of this Rule 1.40 adopted January 2, 2020, effective April 1, 2020, 50 Pa.B. 306; amended April 21, 2026, effective November 1, 2026, 56 Pa.B. 2546. Immediately preceding text appears at serial page (422107).
Plain-English Summary (for reference only — not a substitute for the rule text above)
This summary is not the rule. The rule text controls.
If you can't afford court fees, you can ask the court to waive them. This is sometimes called filing "in forma pauperis." The process for asking follows Pa.R.J.A. 1990, a separate rule that lays out how to apply and what proof of financial need you'll need to show.
Getting your fees waived doesn't automatically mean your case moves forward, though. If the case you're filing along with your fee waiver request doesn't have real legal merit, the judge can throw it out on their own, even if no one else asks them to. This means a fee waiver won't protect a case that the court sees as frivolous or without a valid legal basis.
Committee Notes
Pennsylvania Rule of Judicial Administration 1990 (Application to Waive Fees and Costs (In Forma Pauperis)) sets forth the procedure for seeking or obtaining a waiver of the payment of certain fees and costs. See Pa.R.J.A. 1990(a). The eligibility criteria at Pa.R.J.A. 1990(c) should inform the party whether to proceed by application or praecipe. This rule does not apply in matters before a Register of Wills.
Subdivision (b) enables the court to eliminate frivolous lawsuits involving a party who is requesting a waiver of fees and costs. The effect of such lawsuits on the judicial system was stated by the Supreme Court of the United States in Neitzke v. Williams, 490 U.S. 319 (1989):
We recognize the problems in judicial administration caused by the surfeit of meritless in forma pauperis complaints in the federal courts, not the least of which is the possibility that meritorious complaints will receive inadequate attention or be difficult to identify amidst the overwhelming number of meritless complaints.
Id. at 326. This definition is virtually identical in its statement with the definition of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania in Robinson v. Com., Pa. Board of Probation and Parole, 582 A.2d 857, 860 (Pa. 1990) defining the term ‘‘frivolous’’ as used in Pa.R.A.P. 2744 as ‘‘an appeal which lacks any basis in law or fact.’’
