Plaintiff appeals from an order of the Small Claims Part of the Civil Court of the City of New York, New York County (Anil C. Singh, J.), dated June 16, 2006, which granted defendant's motion to vacate a default judgment.

PER CURIAM

Order (Anil C. Singh, J.), dated June 16, 2006, reversed, without costs, and judgment for plaintiff reinstated.

Defendant failed to offer a reasonable excuse for its underlying default in defending against this small claims action or for its 16-month delay in moving to vacate the default judgment entered, and thus its motion, when finally made, should have been denied regardless of whether it has a potentially meritorious defense (see Gerlin v J. Homann Trucking, 303 AD2d 262 [2003]). While defendant received notice of the judgment in February 2005, it did not file its vacatur motion until June 2006. Defendant's failure to take any action for 16 months was not justified by its sole proffered excuse that it needed time to review relevant loan documents, where plaintiff's claim merely sought to recover interest that she allegedly overpaid on her mortgage.
This Constitutes the Decision and Order of the Court.

I concur I concurI concur
Decision Date: April 16, 2007