Lean Arbitration: Cost Control and Efficiency Through Progressive Identification of Issues and Separate Pricing of Arbitration Services

Abstract

THE COSTLINESS of international commercial arbitration is a frequent subject of complaint. In many cases, the costs of the proceedings are high, compared both with the amount in dispute and with the costs of similar proceedings before the courts.1 When a party brings a case to arbitration and chooses an arbitration centre, an arbitrator and counsel, it wants to win the case, to gain advantages in the procedure and, in defence against advantages sought by the opponent party, to assure fairness and justice to the process and its outcome. Cost considerations probably are of secondary importance in these decisions, at least in the more important cases.2 Nevertheless, the cost of proceedings is receiving increasing attention from arbitration specialists3 and in the debate between the users of arbitration services and those who provide them. The issue of costs is also being used in the competition between different suppliers...