Use This Clause in All Your Contracts
The parties to a contract can provide for arbitration of future disputes by inserting the following clause into their contracts:
Any controversy or claim arising out of or relating to this contract, or the breach thereof, shall be settled by arbitration administered by eQuibbly online at www.eQuibbly.com under its Arbitration Rules, and judgment on the award rendered by the arbitrator(s) may be entered in any court having jurisdiction thereof for enforcement purposes.
Tips for Resolving Your Dispute
Focus on the problem, not the person. Insulting the other party's character or intelligence, making accusations based on what you've heard from others, and telling the other party what you think might be their evil intent, will only serve to put them on the defensive. The other party will become combative and non-cooperative; exactly what you do not want to happen. Frame the problem in terms of what is causing the dispute and possible solutions to that problem that is fair to both parties. You should always be moving towards a solution as the goal.
- For example, you might say to someone: I was upset yesterday when you yelled at my daughter. What did she do to cause you to yell at her? In the future can we agree that if you have an issue with my daughter, either you discuss it with her without yelling, or you tell me what the issue is and I will deal with her myself?
Try find a solution that is fair to both people. Resolving issues between people does not have to be a zero-sum situation where if one party gets what they want the other party does not. If you're creative you can usually find a solution that benefits both parties since most of the time people will place different values on different things. It's usually a matter of exploring some of the options with the other party so that you can discover what matters most to the them.
- For example: If you want your landlord to fix something in your apartment but she keeps saying "no", try to find out why. You might assume that they don't want to spend the money. But it's possible that they simply do not have the cash available in one large sum. if you have enough money in your bank you could offer to pay for it upfront and take it off your next four rent payments. You get what you want and your landlord gets what she wants.
Avoid insults and threats. It may feel great to insult and threaten the other party, but you will not make progress towards a resolution that the other party will honor. At best, they might get scared and say they will do what you want, but they likely will not follow through with it. At worst, you will anger them and make them much less likely to compromise on their position - it will just degenerate into a shouting match where nothing gets resolved.
Ask yourself what a stranger might suggest. Sometimes when a person is involved in a dispute they only see the issues from their perspective and it becomes an "us versus them" mentality. One of the reasons mediators and arbitrators are helpful in a dispute is that they bring a third-person perspective; they can stand back and see the dispute from all sides and be impartial. You can do the same. Assume you are the other person in the dispute and think how you would react and how you would want to resolve the issue. Then assume you are a stranger walking by and you overhear the dispute. What would you think when you hear both sides of the dispute? What would you suggest they do to resolve the issue if they asked your opinion?