When two companies have a disagreement, there are things that can be done before going to court. This is especially true for international disputes as well as those between two or more parties that are located in the sam country. When the parties are in different countries, it may be easier to deal with a conflict through alternative dispute resolution (ADR) techniques than to go through the World Trade Organization (WTO). When international investigations are a part of the equation, the situation is already sufficiently complicated without involving large bureaucracies and courts in different countries.
Reasons to go to an arbitration service:
- It will result in a faster resolution. This is absolutely true when international investigations are part of the mix but also for less complicated conflicts. Even when the disputes in question are domestic, expecting the civil court system to be quick is not realistic. In fact, in the United States, only 4% of all cases actually see the inside of a courtroom. The ADR process is a lot quicker. A lot of this has to do with the fact that parties do not have to wait to get a spot on a court docket to be heard by a judge. They can work on their own time frame. The limiting factors with the ADR process are basically how willing the parties involved are to get the matter settled. There has to be some willingness on behalf of the parties to compromise. The speed will also depend on how complicated the issues around the conflict are.
- The third party will be an expert. When you go to court, after conducting international investigations or just dealing with domestic issues, the judge who will decide the issue may not have any experience at all in dealing with the issues involved in the dispute. When you so to a mediation service, you are going to get an impartial third party who is an expert in the issues involved. That makes them much more able to help get to the right resolution that will be at least somewhat good for all of the parties involved. For example, if the issue is an intellectual property issue, having an expert in this area will make a big difference in finding a resolution that can be accepted by all of the involved parties.
- ADR is a flexible process. Arbitration and mediation are a lot more like conducting a business transaction that engaging in litigation. All of the parties, tells what happened from their perspective to the independent and impartial mediator. This happens in a setting that is far more informal than what would happen in a courtroom. Because it is more relaxed, people can be nervous when they testify in court, a lot more information can be shared. All of the parties involved in the dispute will get a chance to tell their side of what happened in a manner that is easier on them. People tend to feel more like they had their say in this setting than when they go to court.
- The ADR process is confidential. When you go to court, everything said and presented becomes part of the public record. If domestic or international investigations were conducted, all of the information unearthed will become public. That may not always be what the different parties want. When a dispute is dealt with via the mediation process, all of that is kept private and away from the public view. There are a number of reasons companies and individuals might find this to be preferable.
- It saves money. Whenever you decide to take a dispute through the court system or the WTO, the process is elongated. The longer the process takes, the more it will cost everyone involved. By going to a mediation service, the process goes much more quickly and that means it will cost a lot less money. There are also a lot of costs associated with formal court proceedings that can be avoided with mediation.
The bottom line when it comes to resolving both domestic and international disputes between businesses and individuals is that the ADR process is quicker, faster, more private and yields much better results for all parties involved.
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