Dispute Resolution Law
We know that at times Litigation can be expensive, time consuming, a drain of your management resources. It can when approached or advised incorrectly leave even the successful party feeling dissatisfied. There is more to Litigation than principal, recovery of monies or cost/benefit analysis. The choice of forum and the Alternative approaches need to be considered not as a substitute or replacement but as part of a full set of options available to you and on which good strategic/experienced advice is required.
The Courts encouragement of Alternative Dispute Resolution has moved to a point where it may become compulsory in all matters before proceedings can issue. Moreover where a party does not engage with good intentions, they can be subject to an adverse Costs ruling even in circumstances where they are the winning party. ADR as it is known takes on various forms.
The main areas where you are likely to be involved are;
Arbitration:
One of the main advantages of arbitration is that parties can select their own arbitrator and it is a private, confidential process whereby the arbitrators’ decisions are not publicised. The fact that the parties have entered into Arbitration proceedings is not disclosed either. Arbitration is often favoured in International matters and it is quite common to have arbitration in Ireland, under Irish law even when both parties are from outside the jurisdiction. Many agreements require the parties to arbitrate rather than litigate. Even if this is not the case for a particular dispute parties can agree to arbitrate rather than litigate if they wish to do so. Regan’s have extensive arbitration experience and are able to offer advice on the whole process. We will also offer advice on the suitability and availability of particular arbitrators.
Adjudication/Conciliation:
This is predominantly a method of dispute resolution in construction cases. A right to adjudicate is a mandatory sentence of most construction contracts imposed by statute. Adjudication has been of particular use to small sub-contractors who are not able to afford the costs involved in Litigation or Arbitration. Many disputes are resolved through this process which is relatively cheap and very speedy (decisions are usually given within one month from the date the dispute was referred. TIP – If you are a property professional we have a specialist department dedicated to Commercial Property Litigation.
Mediation:
This is an entirely consensual process whereby the parties appoint a mediator, who can be an individual with or without particular training (usually, mediators are accredited by one of the leading organisations such as the Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution (CEDR or ADR). It is important that parties do consider mediation in disputes, as a failure to do so may mean some or all of the costs involved in Litigation will be awarded against the non-compliant party. The mediator has no power, but simply facilitates the parties’ discussions when attempting to reach an agreement. The process is entirely without prejudice and confidential, so anything said cannot be relied upon at a later stage. We have been involved in a large number of mediations from very small disputes between private clients to major commercial mediations involving large number of parties and multiple mediators. We will always advise our client to make settlement decisions that are in your best interests and are not detrimental. Mediation has a very high success rate and enables parties to agree settlements which would not be possible in litigation. We aim to discuss the benefits and appropriateness in all disputes.
Litigation:
If litigation does prove inevitable, we seek to establish with our clients a strategy to achieve agreed milestones, which we keep under review at each stage of the litigation, balancing costs with achievable results. Only a small percentage of disputed cases result in a full trial at Court and whilst we revel in dealing with the cases which go that far and have an extremely high success rate, we pride ourselves in our ability to achieve the best possible outcomes pre-trial for our clients.
The Department has experience in handling a wide range of matters from major disputes to simple debt collection. We have particular expertise in the following areas;
- Contractual Disputes
- Professional Negligence
- Property Disputes
- Partnership
- Nuisance and other Torts
- International Disputes and Jurisdictional challenges
- Construction Disputes
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