Court-Administered Arbitration - An Alternative for Consumer Dispute Resolution (From Consumer Dispute Resolution - Exploring the Alternatives, P 271-295, 1983, Larry Ray and Deborah Smolover, ed. - See NCJ-91236)

• NCJ Number: 91240
• Author(s): D R Hensler; J W Adler
• Date Published: 1983
• Length: 25 pages
• Sale Source: American Bar Assoc
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

Court-administered arbitration, an alternative dispute resolution procedure for civil suits involving small sums of money, could help strengthen the consumer's position in the judicial system.

Abstract

In these programs, litigants take part in an arbitration hearing conducted by attorneys or retired judges who serve voluntarily and receive small honoraria. The hearing is conducted informally, with relaxed rules of evidence, outside of a regular courtroom. The outcomes are legally enforceable, but the parties retain their right to a jury trial through the appeal process. Eight states have authorized such programs. The Pittsburgh program processes a large proportion of the court's civil caseload at an estimated cost, in 1978, of $65 per case. The median time between case filing and arbitrator award is about 3 months. The court administers its arbitration program in a highly centralized fashion. A simple procedure randomly assigns arbitrator panels to cases. About half the cases brought to the program are collection cases; most of the rest are tort suits. The average amount claimed is about $2,500. A high proportion of the litigants are unrepresented. Only one-third of the cases that go to hearing are collection cases. About 80 percent of the cases which are heard result in an award for the plaintiff, and about 18 percent of the cases result in appeals. Six references are supplied.