Mediation – your questions answered

What is mediation and why would I want to use it?

• Where individuals, companies or other organisations are having difficulty resolving a dispute or disagreement they invite a neutral person known as a mediator to help them reach a solution.

• Mediation is a quick, informal and straight-forward way of settling disputes.

• The people involved (generally referred to as the parties) remain in control of the outcome.

• The proceedings are conducted in private.

• The mediator is trained to help you negotiate an acceptable settlement.

• Mediation is a lower cost option to court action.

• Even if the mediation is unsuccessful you have neither prejudiced nor sacrificed your legal rights.

What kind of disputes or disagreements can be addressed by mediation and when can mediation be used?

• Mediation can help solve almost any kind of dispute - within families or communities, between neighbours, work colleagues or companies.

• Mediation can be used at any stage in a dispute where the people involved feel that an independent person may help them avoid matters getting out-of-hand and costing them vast amounts of money.

How do I start the mediation process?

Once those involved in the dispute have agreed to try mediation, they contact MTVM giving brief details of the problem.  The Administrator will respond quickly to your enquiry with suggestions as to how you could proceed.

What happens in a mediation?

Each mediator has their own approach but generally all will proceed as follows:

• The mediator will arrange the mediation at a time and location convenient to the parties.  Either you or the other party may provide rooms or alternatively MTVM can arrange neutral facilities for the meeting.

• Before the mediation starts the mediator will explain in more detail how the mediation will proceed.  He/she will have already contacted you in advance to answer anty questions you may have.

• The mediator will then ask each party to summarize briefly the dispute as they see it.

• At this point the mediator may well suggest a series of confidential private meetings with each of the parties, moving between these meetings and, if appropriate, bringing the parties back together again for a joint session, but only if you agree.

• By this process the parties move towards a settlement of the dispute at which point an agreement is drawn up and signed at the meeting.

Will mediation work and what will it cost?

• Mediation has a high success rate but of course there can be no guaranteed outcome.  The mediator is there to help but it is up to the parties involved to develop their own solution to the dispute.

• The cost will vary depending on the value and the complexity of the dispute.  However the parties share the cost of the mediator whose basis of charge will be known and agreed before the mediation starts.

What happens if the other side refuses to mediate?

You may ask MTVM to try and persuade the other party to agree to try mediation.  There are a lot of good reasons to mediate a dispute and we will always try and help you reach a decision which is right for you.

How long does mediation take?

This also depends on the complexity of the dispute and the number of parties involved.  Most mediations do not last more than a few hours.

What happens if there are more than two parties in dispute?

Mediation is very flexible process and ideally suited to multi-party disputes.  By bringing all the parties together there is an opportunity to reach a solution acceptable to the parties.