Arbitration is an internationally recognized practice.
One way to avoid lawsuits is to go to arbitration. The practice of arbitrating disputes outside the courtroom with neutral third parties has been used in the United States since the 1920s. One of the main organizations that provides professional arbitration services is American Arbitration Association (AAA). AAA has four areas of expertise in which it decides disputes. Each is subdivided into more specific specialties and each has its own unique set of rules and procedures.
Commercial Rules
The AAA commercial rules allows merchant corporations to set up a system whereby a dissatisfied consumer of one of its goods or services is required to settle any grievance arising from the purchase of a good or service. These rules are industry-specific and cover class arbitration, general commercial, commercial finance, amateur and professional sports, real estate industry, intra-industry reinsurance, securities arbitration, wills and trusts, construction industry, corporate bankruptcy, insurance industry, and intellectual property (for patents, trademarks, and licensing).
Included are the following special programs: Automobile Industry Special Binding Arbitration Program, eCommerce Dispute Management, the Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) Claims Program, the Energy Industry ADR Program, the Healthcare-related ADR Program, the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association Program, and International Centre for Dispute Resolution (for the global business community).
The protocols for this arena are very detailed and tailored to not only the specific industry, but also the size of the business and the complexity of the dispute.
Consumer Rules
The AAA consumer rules are supplementary to the commercial rules. While the latter is more geared toward the benefit of merchant corporations to get disputes resolved, the former is more geared toward consumers of household and personal goods and services. However, the AAA reserves the right to decide on a case-by-case basis whether to invoke the consumer rules that also include consumer debt collection arbitration. The procedures encompassed within this genre are subdivided into mediation rules, arbitration rules and expedited rules. Because these are a supplement of the commercial rules, they can not stand alone.
Employment Rules
The AAA employment rules govern workplace disputes, such as wrongful termination, harassment, and discrimination between employers and employees.These rules incorporate all federal and state statutes on the topics, including due process.The conventions in this section include the determination of arbitration fees, decide whether the arbitration ruling is binding and the protocol to enforce due process.
Labor Rules
The AAA labor rules address issues that come about as a result of the collective bargaining process between labor unions and management. The various areas include labor arbitration, pension arbitration, employee benefit plan arbitration, union fees arbitration and grievance mediation. Some of the rules in this area deal with adherence to the collective bargaining clause of labor contracts, the procedure of naming the tribunal in which to conduct arbitration, and the methods by which parties may disclose and challenge any ruling.
