Is Arbitration better Than Litigation for Businesses?

A Southern California corporate litigation attorney can assist you in determining the best approach to resolving business disputes. An attorney can provide you with advice on the best options for resolution, regardless of whether you are a plaintiff or a defendant in a particular legal matter. Your attorney can also assist you in taking steps in advance of disputes arising to make sure that you can force arbitration as a method of dispute resolution if you decide you want to protect your company against litigation.

Brown & Charbonneau, LLP understands arbitration, mediation, litigation, and other methods of dispute resolution. We offer invaluable advice to companies both in minimizing the risk of lawsuits and in making sure they respond in the most strategically appropriate manner when a claim arises. Give us a call today to find out more.

Is Arbitration Preferable to Litigation for Businesses?

Arbitration can be preferable to litigation for many business disputes. Arbitration can be beneficial because:

• You don’t have to worry about a jury. Juries sometimes make decisions based on emotion, or based on other factors outside of the letter of the law. You don’t have to worry about this as much with arbitration, which is overseen by a professional arbitrator.
• You can keep disputes private. Arbitration proceedings can be kept confidential and even the fact that a disagreement has arisen does not necessarily have to be disclosed.
• You can select an arbitrator with insider knowledge. If your dispute arises out of a technical issue, you can select an arbitrator with the understanding that is necessary to make an informed decision. This can result in better outcomes than asking a jury with no industry experience to try to make decisions on complex business matters.

If you think arbitration may be right for you, or if you are not certain about the best possible approach to resolving a dispute, you should contact an Orange County corporate litigation attorney for help. Brown & Charbonneau, LLP can provide you with advice on what the best dispute resolution process is given the specifics of your situation.

How to Resolve Disputes in Arbitration

If you are involved in a dispute and someone has made a claim against your company, you may not necessarily have the option to resolve the disagreement in arbitration.

If you have an arbitration clause in place, you should be able to insist on arbitration and should be able to get any civil case in court dismissed. Arbitration clauses are almost always enforceable, unless the contract was not a negotiated one and the clause is unfair to the other party. This means if you put an arbitration clause into an agreement, you can insist upon the court enforcing that clause and arbitration will be the only option for the claimant to seek a remedy from you.

If there is no arbitration clause, you and the other party to the disagreement could voluntarily agree to resolve the dispute in arbitration. This is sometimes done among business partners or between companies and suppliers who must continue working together after the disagreement is resolved and who want to avoid adversarial litigation. However, if you are voluntarily agreeing to an alternative method of dispute resolution, mediation is usually preferable to arbitration since mediation puts the power to compromise in your hands.

If you cannot agree to arbitrate and you do not have an arbitration clause, then you will not have a choice but to either resolve the case in court or try to get the other party to accept a settlement. As many as 97 percent of cases are resolved via means other than civil litigation, according to The Journal of the American Judges Association . This means you likely can keep your case out of court if you would prefer to do so and if you believe that an out-of-court resolution will be better for your business organization.

Getting Help from an Orange County Corporate Litigation Attorney

Brown & Charbonneau, LLP provides assistance in drafting and negotiating contracts with arbitration clauses so you can make certain that disputes are resolved in arbitration and your company stays out of court. We can also provide you with help in achieving a resolution when a dispute arises. We represent both plaintiffs and defendants in a wide variety of business disputes and we have the legal knowledge you need to choose the best approach and fight for the best outcomes. To find out more about how an Orange County corporate litigation attorney can help you, give us a call at 714-505-3000 or contact us online.