SUBP-010 is a California Judicial Council mandatory-use form — the Deposition Subpoena for Production of Business Records used to compel a custodian to produce documents without requiring personal appearance. Issued under Code of Civil Procedure §§ 2020.410-2020.440 and Government Code § 68097.1, it is the workhorse of California civil records discovery, governing how attorneys obtain business records, medical records, employee records, and other documentary evidence in the course of litigation.
A business records subpoena lets parties obtain records from non-party witnesses — banks, employers, hospitals, and other organizations that hold documents material to the case. This article walks through the form section by section, identifies the statutory hooks that govern each field, and highlights the three drafting errors that account for most rejected records subpoenas in California civil practice.
SUBP-010 is the California Judicial Council’s mandatory-use form for a deposition subpoena duces tecum directed at a custodian of business records, governed by CCP §§ 2020.410-2020.440. It compels production of records — by sealed mail to a deposition officer, by delivery to the deposition officer at the witness’s business address with copying costs paid, or by inspection at the custodian’s business address — without requiring personal appearance, provided the production is accompanied by an Evidence Code § 1561 affidavit. Records must be produced no sooner than 20 days after issuance or 15 days after service, whichever is later.
Countrywide Process
May 28, 2026
The SUBP-010 form has four numbered items that drive its mechanics. The table below summarizes what each requires and the statutory anchor that governs it.
| Item | What it Requires | Statutory Anchor | Common Drafting Issue |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Delivery method — sealed mail to the deposition officer, delivery to the deposition officer at the witness’s business address with copying costs paid, or inspection at the custodian’s business address. | CCP § 2020.430 | Failing to check a delivery method box leaves the custodian guessing how to comply. |
| 2 | Production timing — no sooner than 20 days after issuance or 15 days after service, whichever is later. Records must be accompanied by an Evidence Code § 1561 affidavit of the custodian. | CCP § 2020.410(c); Evid. Code §§ 1560, 1561, 1563 | Production dates set too soon — a hard rejection trigger. |
| 3 | Description of records — exact documents identified with enough specificity that the custodian can locate them without independent judgment. Form of electronically stored information (ESI) specified if applicable. | CCP § 2020.410(a) | “Any and all documents” demands — the single most common drafting error. |
| 4 | Consumer/employee records warning — if the subpoena seeks consumer or employee records, a SUBP-025 notice and the related objection procedure may govern production. | CCP §§ 1985.3, 1985.6 | Failing to serve SUBP-025 on the consumer or employee before serving SUBP-010 on the custodian. |
SUBP-010 is the right form when the records themselves are the discovery target and the custodian’s testimony is not required. Unlike a civil subpoena for trial appearance, SUBP-010 seeks specific documents from a custodian — a subpoena to a hospital for treating-physician records uses SUBP-010, because the records and the § 1561 affidavit are sufficient. SUBP-015 compels personal appearance only; SUBP-020 compels combined appearance plus document production. Choose SUBP-010 when records can stand alone through the custodian’s affidavit — the case for most records-discovery subpoenas in California civil practice.
Under CCP § 1986, a SUBP-010 subpoena may be issued by the court clerk, by a judge, or by an attorney of record in the action. In day-to-day litigation, the attorney of record self-issues by signing the form directly — the clerk-signature path is reserved for self-represented litigants and matters where local rules require it. The subpoena is a court process in a specific legal case, not a private demand; the recipient’s obligation to comply is enforceable through the court’s contempt and sanctions powers.
SUBP-010 must be personally served on the custodian under CCP § 2020.220. Any person of legal age who is not a party to the action may make service, though in practice most attorneys use a registered California process server because the proof of service must demonstrate compliance with statutory service requirements. The $15.00 records-only witness fee under Government Code § 68097.2 must be tendered at the time of service, and the SUBP-025 Notice to Consumer or Employee — when applicable — must already have been served on the consumer or employee.
Item 1 of SUBP-010 offers three delivery methods. Method (a) is sealed mail: the custodian places a copy of the records in a sealed inner wrapper labeled with the case caption and date, then encloses that in an outer envelope and mails it to the deposition officer. Method (b) is delivery to the deposition officer at the witness’s business address upon receipt of the reasonable copying costs allowed by Evidence Code § 1563(b). Method (c) is inspection: the attorney’s representative inspects the original records at the custodian’s business address and copies them during normal business hours.
Method (a) — sealed mail — is the default in most matters and the option most custodians prefer. The records arrive at the deposition officer’s location, who maintains custody until the production date or until released by stipulation. Method (b) is useful when the volume of records makes mail impractical or when the custodian prefers in-person delivery. Method (c) is reserved for matters where original records must be inspected (handwriting analysis, document-age questions, original signatures) — situations where copies will not suffice.
Item 3 requires identification of records with enough specificity that the custodian can locate and produce them without exercising independent judgment. Adequate descriptions name the patient or party, the date range, the document categories (medical records, billing records, imaging studies, correspondence), and — for ESI — the form in which the information is to be produced. A bare “any and all documents” demand fails this standard and is the most reliable basis for a successful objection.
The drafting standard is operational, not aspirational. A custodian who must make judgment calls about what falls within a vague request will either produce too little (and the subpoenaing party gets nothing useful) or produce too much (and the response includes privileged or irrelevant materials the attorney must sort and return). Subpoenas with precise document descriptions move through production in days. Vague ones generate objections, motion practice, and weeks of delay.
Under CCP § 2020.410(c), the production date set in Item 1 must be no sooner than 20 days after the deposition subpoena is issued by the court clerk or attorney, or 15 days after service on the custodian, whichever date is later. This protects the custodian’s ability to locate, copy, and certify the records, and provides the consumer or employee — when applicable — the statutory notice window under CCP §§ 1985.3 or 1985.6 before production occurs.
Calculate the production date by taking the later of (a) the issuance date plus 20 calendar days, or (b) the projected service date plus 15 calendar days. Build a buffer of 3-5 days beyond the minimum because custodians reasonably push back on tight production dates, and giving them the statutory minimum invites delays.
The Evidence Code § 1561 affidavit is the custodian-of-records declaration that accompanies the produced records and authenticates them as business records. Without it, the records are not admissible at trial under the business-records hearsay exception in Evidence Code § 1271. The affidavit certifies that the producing entity is the custodian, that the records were prepared in the regular course of business, and that they are true copies of the originals on file.
The § 1561 affidavit is what makes SUBP-010 records-only — without personal appearance, the affidavit is the authentication mechanism that lets records come into evidence. Hospitals, banks, employers, and other institutional custodians typically have standard § 1561 affidavit forms. Smaller custodians sometimes do not, and the subpoenaing attorney is well-advised to send a fill-in-the-blank § 1561 affidavit along with the subpoena form to remove that friction from the custodian’s workflow.
Pro tip — from the field. Three drafting errors account for most SUBP-010 rejections by hospital and medical-provider custodians: (1) the $15 records-only witness fee was not enclosed with service; (2) the Item 3 records description was too vague for the custodian to locate the records without a chart review; and (3) the SUBP-025 Notice to Consumer was not served on the patient before the subpoena was served on the custodian. Confirming all three before service — fee enclosed, description specific, SUBP-025 served — eliminates most of the back-and-forth that delays the record retrieval process.
A SUBP-010 records subpoena requires a SUBP-025 Notice to Consumer or Employee whenever the records sought are the personal records of a consumer (CCP § 1985.3) or the employment records of an employee (CCP § 1985.6). Medical records, banking records, credit-card records, insurance records, telephone records, most utility records, and personnel files all fall within these categories. The SUBP-025 must be served on the consumer or employee at least 10 days before the production date and at least 5 days before SUBP-010 is served on the custodian.
Item 4 of the SUBP-010 form puts the custodian on notice that if a motion to quash or written objection has been served, the custodian must not produce the records absent a court order or the agreement of the affected parties. A business that receives a records subpoena also has the right to file a written objection if the request is overly broad or imposes an unreasonable burden. This is the statutory backstop for the consumer’s and employee’s privacy rights. Serve SUBP-025 first, wait the statutory notice period, then serve SUBP-010 on the custodian. Reversing the order or compressing the timing creates a successful objection ground.
This article is the form-specific companion to California Civil Subpoenas: A Practical Guide to CCP §§ 1985 through 1997, which covers the broader framework and the relationships among the six Judicial Council forms (SUBP-001, SUBP-002, SUBP-010, SUBP-015, SUBP-020, SUBP-025). For strategic context on why records-discovery documentation standards are tightening in 2026, see The State of Process Serving in 2026, the hub piece for this editorial cluster.
Upcoming articles will cover SUBP-015 (Deposition Subpoena for Personal Appearance) and SUBP-020 (Deposition Subpoena for Personal Appearance and Production of Documents and Things). Attorneys and paralegals who want primary-source guidance can also consult their county law library, many of which maintain California subpoena self-help resources. For multi-state matters where an out-of-state subpoena needs to be domesticated for service on a California custodian, see How to Domesticate an Out-of-State Subpoena in California. Operational support is available through the Countrywide Process Process Serving service.
This article is provided for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. SUBP-010 is a California Judicial Council mandatory-use form whose current revision is dated January 1, 2012, governed by Code of Civil Procedure §§ 2020.410-2020.440, Evidence Code §§ 1560-1563, Government Code §§ 68097.1 and 68097.2, and the consumer-records and employee-records provisions of Code of Civil Procedure §§ 1985.3 and 1985.6. The form and statutory citations referenced should be verified against the current version on the California courts website and the applicable local rules of the receiving court. Legal teams should consult qualified counsel to ensure compliance with the rules applicable to their specific matters. Countrywide Process assumes no liability for reliance on this information without consultation of applicable legal authorities.
The witness fee for a SUBP-010 deposition subpoena duces tecum for production of business records is $15.00 under California Government Code § 68097.2, payable to the records custodian at the time of service. This is a one-time records-only fee, distinct from the $35.00-per-day witness fee for personal-appearance subpoenas under Government Code § 68093. The records-only fee covers the custodian’s administrative cost of locating and producing the records, separate from any reasonable copying costs recoverable under Evidence Code § 1563(b).
Under CCP § 2020.410(c), the records production date on a SUBP-010 deposition subpoena must be set no sooner than 20 days after the subpoena is issued or 15 days after it is served on the custodian, whichever is later. This is the minimum statutory window; in practice, subpoenaing attorneys set the production date 5-7 days beyond the statutory minimum to give the custodian working time and to accommodate the SUBP-025 consumer/employee notice window when applicable
Yes. The Evidence Code § 1561 affidavit of the custodian of records must accompany the records produced in response to a SUBP-010 subpoena, per CCP § 2020.430 and Evidence Code § 1561. The affidavit authenticates the records as business records prepared in the regular course of business and makes them admissible at trial under the business-records exception to the hearsay rule. Without the § 1561 affidavit, the records are unauthenticated and not admissible
Yes. Item 3 of SUBP-010 specifically allows the form or forms in which electronically stored information is to be produced to be specified. ESI requests should identify the data sets sought, the date range, and the desired production format (native files, PDF, CSV, etc.). California discovery rules for ESI under CCP §§ 2031.280-2031.290 apply to records subpoenas just as they apply to party discovery, with the production-format specification being the most practically important detail.
Under CCP § 1992, a custodian who fails to comply with a properly issued and properly served SUBP-010 subpoena, without lawful excuse, is subject to a $500 forfeiture plus damages caused by the failure, recoverable in a civil action by the aggrieved party. The custodian may also be held in contempt under CCP § 1209. In practice, before pursuing enforcement, subpoenaing attorneys typically meet and confer with the custodian to identify and resolve technical objections — most non-compliance is procedural rather than willful and gets resolved without motion practice.
Working with Countrywide Process. Countrywide Process serves California SUBP-010 records subpoenas across all 58 California counties, with the $15 witness fee tender, custodian-of-records protocols, and SUBP-025 consumer/employee notice coordination that current documentation standards expect. We maintain working relationships with the major hospital systems, banks, employer custodians, and government records repositories — and we know which production formats each one prefers. Explore the Process Serving Services page for California subpoena service generally, or the Subpoena Domestication service for out-of-state matters requiring UIDDA domestication in California.
