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January 28, 2015 · 8:57 AM

Construction Arbitration Is Too Lengthy & Costly. The AAA Hopes to Fix That.

As I noted last November, there’s a growing concern among construction industry stakeholders and others that arbitration too often fails to serve its intended purpose as a speedy, less costly and more streamlined alternative to civil litigation. This rising chorus has complained that pre-hearing discovery is too extensive and drawn out, the hearings themselves take too long, and at the end of the day, no meaningful cost savings are actually achieved.

The American Arbitration Association (“AAA”) is taking those concerns seriously.

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Tagged as alternative dispute resolution, arbitration v. litigation, construction arbitration, is arbitration expensive, resolving construction disputes through arbitration, Supplementary Rules for Fixed Time and Cost Construction Arbitration

November 14, 2014 · 8:57 AM

Custom-Build Your Next Arbitration Clause

Image by Tingeling via Pixabay.com

Of all the great AEC content in the Twitterverse this week, the following chirp from Kansas City construction attorney Rob Pitkin (@KCconstrlawyer) really piqued my interest:

Alternatives to traditional "all disputes" Arbitration clause: http://t.co/cO0I4ccycC via @NYREJ

— Rob Pitkin (@KCconstrlawyer) November 12, 2014

Rob’s tweet links to this article from Gary Rubin, a New York construction lawyer, about how to make arbitration more cost-effective. Gary discusses how parties can use the contract negotiation phase of their relationship to craft a better arbitration provision. He even suggests helpful language aimed at curtailing the duration of the hearings and the arbitrators’ authority to award certain types of damages.

All of which crystallized something I’ve been thinking about in recent years: arbitration is not a “one-size fits all” deal. While in theory arbitration presents construction industry stakeholders with an attractive alternative to the very public, very long and very expensive litigation process, in practice, arbitration procedures and costs often elude the parties’ control. These are by no means novel thoughts on my part; a number of other observers have raised similar concerns (see here and here for a couple examples).

Now for the good news.

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