5,310
edits
Changes
→The arbitration process
When people agree or are required to arbitrate their dispute, they first pick their arbitrator. The arbitrator you choose should be someone who is an expert in family law, and perhaps even an expert in family law with special knowledge or skills concerning the most important issues in your dispute. You probably want to choose someone who has a lot of experience as an arbitrator, someone who has a good reputation in the legal community, and, most importantly, someone you see as being neutral, fair-minded and unbiased.
After picking the arbitrator, the arbitrator will ask the parties to sign a participation agreement, usually called an ''arbitration agreement.'' This agreement does three things. First, it serves as the arbitrator's retainer agreement, and describes how the arbitrator will charge for their services and when they will expect to be paid. (You can read more about retainer agreements in the [[Introduction to the Legal System for Family Matters|Understanding the Legal System]] chapter, in the [[You & Your Lawyer|You and Your Lawyer]] section.) Second, it describes the parties' rights and responsibilities in the process, as well as the responsibilities of the arbitrator and the scope of their authority. Third, it summarizes the legal issues the arbitrator will address.
The next step is to meet with the arbitrator to discuss the process leading to the arbitration hearing, decide the date and place for the hearing, and pick the rules that will govern the hearing. This meeting is called a ''prehearing conference'', and picking the rules that will govern the hearing is sometimes the most important part of the arbitration process. A lot of the time, the rules that people select are taken from the more important parts of the [http://canlii.ca/t/8q3k Supreme Court Family Rules] that talk about evidence, experts, and hearing procedures. However, there are lots of other options. People can pick the rules that best suit the circumstances of their children, the nature of their dispute, and the status of their finances. It's important to be as thoughtful as possible in decided deciding what rules are necessary. Arbitration can look just like going to court, but it doesn't have to. It can be a lot more focussed and , a lot more efficient, and a lot faster.
How the arbitration process works after the prehearing conference depends will depend on the rules you've picked.
====The basic arbitration process====
Most of the time, the next step after the prehearing conference requires the parties to exchange involves exchanging the documents and information that are relevant to their the legal issues in the dispute. If child support is an issue, for example, financial statements might be prepared and documents like income tax returns, T4 slips, and paystubs might be exchanged. If property is an issue, you might need tax assessments, purchase documents, mortgage statements, and maybe a professional valuation appraisal of the current fair market value of the property.
You need to think carefully about what sort of documents and information you need. For complicated problems, the parties you might also hire an expert to give an opinion about things like the value of a pension, a tax problem, or the best parenting arrangements for the children. (That last kind of opinion is called a ''parenting assessment'' or a ''section 211 report'', and is usually prepared by a psychologist, clinical counsellor, or social worker. You can get more information about these assessments in the first section of the [[Children and Parenting after Separation]] chapter, under the heading ''[[Children_and_Parenting_after_Separation#Reports_and_assessments Reports and Assessments''.) You might also need to exchange bank statements, credit card statements and corporate financial statements. The nature of the documents that are important, the extent of the disclosure that is required, and the type of expert opinions that are most useful will change depending on the circumstances, the legal issues, and how the parties decide to approach the arbitration process.
Once the relevant documents have been exchanged and any expert opinions have been completed, each party will start to work on how they're going to present their case to the arbitrator and on the documents they'll want to refer the arbitrator to at the hearing. These might include: