Commercial mediation is a process that parties to a dispute can go through, which is a way of making an attempt to resolve the dispute, the place an impartial third party is appointed to act as a facilitator between them to help them negotiate a settlement dispute. That impartial third party isn’t a judge. They’re not going to make a choice on the evidence or inform you who’s right and who’s flawed and who wins and who loses. They will allow you to see either party’s position and help them come to a settlement.
The process of commercial mediation
It’s a completely voluntary process. You should not have to attend commercial mediation, and if you find yourself at a mediation, you’ll be able to depart at any time. However it is a superb opportunity to have a commercial dispute case settled without the need for the proceedings to either, if they have already started, proceed and continue at increased costs for each parties, or alternatively, have a mediation at an early stage earlier than any litigation has started in an try to avoid these costs starting or running away from the parties at a really early stage.
So, it’s a form of different dispute resolution, which is an umbrella term for many methods of making an attempt to resolve disputes without having to engage in court proceedings, and it is changing into more and more prevalent in businesses’ minds when they’re having a dispute.
Fairly than, “Let’s have a big argument and spending a number of costs and lots of time in dealing with the dispute”, “How can we get to the tip of the dispute in a quicker way and a more value-efficient way?” And commercial mediation is a large part of that and a superb way of reaching that end goal in a a lot more cost- and time-environment friendly manner.
Do I’ve to attend commercial mediation?
Mediation is a voluntary process, but there might be adverse price consequences in litigation if a court believes that a party has unreasonably refused to mediate.
So, if one party to a dispute makes a suggestion of mediation, it can be very prudent, unless there’s an especially good reason why the opposite party doesn’t wish to mediate, and those reasons may be that the opposite party’s case doesn’t have any merit or the worth of the case concerned could be such that the costs of mediation, even attending a mediation could be disproportionate to the worth of the dispute.
However, that aside, you would need to have a fairly good reason to not, to not mediate. In any other case, a court could make an adverse costs order against a party who has unreasonably refused to mediate.
So, it is a case really that the court does count on the parties always and all stages of a dispute to attempt to reach a settlement, not essentially via mediation completely, but the court does count on the parties to try and attain a settlement. And mediation, as we’ve got already mentioned, is an effective way of doing that in a well timed and value-efficient manner.
Is the end result of commercial mediation legally binding?
The outcome of mediation would be legally binding in very particular circumstances, and that is once an agreement recording the position reached at mediation in a legally binding document.
So, it’s recorded in writing and signed by those parties to the dispute. Till that has occurred, the result of a mediation will not be legally binding, and it would be open to either party to the mediation to renege on the agreement or not enter into the agreement or seek to try and change the agreement for each in the course of the course of the mediation, up till the point that it is being recorded in writing and signed by the parties. And therefore, we advise purchasers who’re at mediation and have gone by means of the process of reaching a settlement at mediation to try their utmost to get that agreement signed on the day of the mediation. And typically, the recording of the agreement can take just as lengthy, if not longer, as to actually the parties reaching the agreement at mediation themselves.