Appeal from an order of the Civil Court of the City of New York, Kings County (Kathryn E. Freed, J.), entered October 8, 2008. The order denied plaintiffs' motion to vacate a prior order which, among other things, had granted defendant's motion for summary judgment dismissing the complaint upon plaintiffs' failure to appear for oral argument.

ORDERED that the order is affirmed without costs.

To be entitled to vacatur of the order granting defendant's motion for summary judgment upon plaintiffs' failure to appear for oral argument, plaintiffs were required to establish, pursuant to CPLR 5015 (a) (1), both a reasonable excuse for their default and a meritorious defense to defendant's motion (see St. Rose v McMorrow, 43 AD3d 1146 [2007]). Plaintiffs did not sufficiently set forth a reasonable excuse for their failure to appear on the return date of defendant's motion for summary judgment (see McClaren v Bell Atl., 30 AD3d 569 [2006]; see also Uniform Rules for Civ Ct [22 NYCRR] § 208.14). Plaintiffs' allegation of law office failure is factually insufficient (see Robinson v New York City Tr. Auth., 203 AD2d 351 [1994]), in that they failed to explain whether the normal two-part procedure for assigning a per diem attorney to cover a court appearance, as outlined in their submission to the court, was followed in its entirety. Accordingly, plaintiffs' motion to vacate the prior order was properly denied.

Weston, J.P., Rios and Steinhardt, JJ., concur.
Decision Date: November 13, 2009