Articles

22 Aug 2012

Co-mediation for complex multi-party disputes

A recent co-mediation of a large IT case has shown how effective this can be in resolving

a complex multi-party dispute.

The case involved a failed IT project in the public sector where the customer had tried for

more than five years to reach a settlement with the supplier before starting litigation. This

quickly led to claims and counter-claims involving a total of five parties with the total

costs of the litigation estimated at nearly £3m.

Having looked at the option of a two day mediation with a single mediator, the parties

chose to have the case co-mediated by two mediators, Chris Newmark and Duncan

Campbell, both with extensive experience of IT disputes.

The dispute was effectively mediated at two levels. The first was the financial settlement

of the claimant’s claims and the second was how this amount was to be shared between

the defendants. The two mediators working as a closely linked team were able to operate

on these two levels in parallel, reducing the downtime between sessions and bring about a

settlement in one day.

Keeping up the momentum through a co-mediation made much more efficient use of the

parties’ time, cut costs and made the overall settlement possible. For disputes of this

kind, co-mediation could well be the most realistic solution.

Duncan Campbell

30th January 2008