Hybrid Mediation For Family Disputes
If your case is one involving high conflict and/or complex issues and you would like to try to reach agreement away from court, with the support of lawyers and mediators, you may wish to explore Hybrid Mediation.
What is Hybrid Mediation?
Hybrid Mediation a model of mediation designed to facilitate dispute resolution in high conflict and/or complex issue cases.
It allows for greater involvement of advisors and experts and affords you a place to explore issues and options away from court with the expectation that, with the support of your mediator and your paid professionals, you will more readily be able to reach an agreement.
With the court’s time in high demand, its resources stretched to its limits and with ever increasing costs associated with litigation, hybrid mediation is aimed at those who are willing to consider another way in a without prejudice and confidential setting.
Unlike arbitration or early neutral evaluation, hybrid mediation will allow you to keep control of the decision making guided by your advisors and experts, facilitated by your mediator.
Why people are turning to Hybrid Mediation to resolve family disputes?
Non Court Dispute Resolution is the new watch word.
What does it mean? It means Judges want you to try to settle your issues away from Court.
Mediation, Arbitration, Early Neutral Evaluation will become the new “go to” pre-court requirements as parties now have to show why how they have attempted to resolve disputes in one of these forums before attending Court.
Hybrid mediation is a type of mediation used in family cases and will become increasingly popular against this new family law landscape.
How does Hybrid Mediation work?
Different from the usual family mediation model parties are in separate rooms and lawyers and other professional advisors can be present too. Unlike the usual model not all information discussed with the mediator is shared.
Usually carried out over a day, rather than a series of sessions, it allows a binding agreement to be drawn up by your lawyers at the end of a successful days mediation.
What are the benefits of Hybrid Mediation?
Quicker: hybrid mediation can take place over the course of a day; people can have their lawyers present in the process avoiding delays between meetings whilst they take advice, and the lawyers can draw up the consent order straightaway once the proposals are agreed;
Cost effective: being actively involved in the process means people do not have to repeatedly update their lawyers with the progress of the discussions; it reduces correspondence and the risk of misunderstandings or disagreements between the solicitors;
Reduces conflict: separate meetings mean heavily emotional joint meetings can be avoided thereby enabling people to focus on the issues and outcomes in a calmer and more rational way;
Participants are empowered and supported: hybrid mediation provides a safe and supported environment for people who might not otherwise be willing to mediate;
Increases certainty of outcome: As lawyers can be more directly involved in the process, and are on hand to advise with the full knowledge of the issues and direction of discussions, there is less risk that people may change their minds as can happen when advice is sought by people in between meetings;
Confidential: People can confidentially explore options with the mediator without commitment or raising expectations, meaning progress can be made because more options are brought to the table more quickly.
What sorts of cases can be sorted using hybrid mediation?
Hybrid Mediation is suitable in all family matters:
Relationship breakdown of married people, civil partners, or cohabitees;
Financial cases (including those with an international element),
Child arrangements (including those with an international element),
Inheritance issues;
Family disputes that may involve other family members such as parents who have a financial interest, or grandparents.
When is hybrid mediation appropriate?
Hybrid mediation is particularly useful in the following situations
When the issues in the case are complex
Where separate meetings (which can be supported by lawyers) would be beneficial
When either of the people may feel unable to sit in the room with the other person
If there is an imbalance of power between the participants to the mediation
Where there are high levels of conflict
If there is a concern about domestic abuse, an imbalanced power dynamic, or another reason why either person finds it hard to have a voice;
Where an element of confidentiality is needed
Get In Touch
Hybrid Mediation FAQs
Simply click on the “PLUS” signs below to find out more details about Hybrid Mediation and how it may work for you…
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Individual confidential meetings can help people discuss things with the mediator in a way they might not feel comfortable doing if the other person were also present.
People can explore options with the mediator without commitment or raising expectations.
This encourages people to bring options to the table more quickly, and provides the mediator with insight into their desired outcomes and priorities.
The mediator has a sense of the opportunities for settlement and the areas of commonality thereby narrowing the issues and facilitating mutually agreed outcomes at an early stage.
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The exact things that are kept confidential are specific to each person and situation, and normally include the reasoning behind options for settlement or the people’s hopes and concerns. There are things the mediator cannot keep confidential such as financial information (e.g. the existence of an asset), or matters relating to the safeguarding of children.
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Hybrid Mediations are generally run over a day. The costs of the mediator in Hybrid Mediation are generally met equally by the participants, but can be whatever proportions they decide.
The costs of lawyers is paid for separately, each person will be responsible for their own lawyer’s costs. The amount of the lawyers’ costs will depend upon their chargeable rates, and the extent to which they need to be involved in the process.
While there is front loading of costs in Hybrid Mediation it is cost effective because it reduces the lawyers’ direct involvement in the process; reduces the need for people to meet their lawyers between meetings; reduces the need for solicitor correspondence and at the end of a successful Hybrid Mediation the lawyers are on hand to draw up and agree any orders, avoiding the need for subsequent correspondence or the need for the mediator to prepare a separate Memorandum of Understanding.
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Yes: hybrid mediation can be used before proceedings are issued and during the course of Court proceedings. If the Court process has started, it can be put on hold to give people the opportunity to try and resolve their dispute through mediation. The use of mediation is encouraged by the Courts.
Even if all issues cannot be resolved through mediation, narrowing the issues will assist in reducing the costs and length of any subsequent proceedings.
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Because Hybrid mediation is a highly flexible model it is a very effective tool in the dispute resolution tool box.
People are often surprised by how beneficial the flexibility of confidentiality can be – it can serve to not only enable people to be more open with the mediator than they could if the other person were in the room, but also to actually discover helpful ways of thinking about things that may actually make a big difference if shared with the other person in an appropriate way.
Studies have shown that mediation results in a mediated outcome in a large majority of cases.
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Jo Chawla and Emma Bugg are Resolution accredited Hybrid Mediators. You can contact them at info@horizonmediation.co.uk and we will fix an appointment to talk through the issues and the next steps.
If you have a lawyer they can give you details of mediators trained in the hybrid mediation model. Details of mediators trained in the hybrid mediation model can also be found on the Resolution website
Acknowledgments
Authors: Margaret Kelly, KMJ Solicitors,Rebekah Gershuny, Evolve Family Mediation and Matthew Richardson, Coram Chambers for Resolution.
@mrichardsonlaw @evolvefamilymed and @MargaretKCIArb