Ombudsman Services announces new commercial dispute resolution service

Ombudsman Services has announced a new dispute resolution service that will help businesses resolve commercial disputes.

The organisation says that the service – called Business to Business ADR – will be available to businesses across the UK and Ireland that are engaged in commercial disputes either by agreement or by the activation of a contract clause. The scheme aims to provide procedures that are simple to use, providing quality, access, choice and flexibility at a competitive price and is being run in partnership with barristers’ chambers Clerksroom.

Ombudsman Services said that new services facilitating and deciding on the resolution of commercial disputes will be added in the coming months. The service will eventually deal with a wide spectrum of disputes ranging from late payments to multi-million pound settlements.

Business development director and accredited mediator at Ombudsman Services, Gregory Hunt, said: “This group of mediators has been handpicked based upon their market profile, their flexibility and their determination to provide a first class service, and also because they share our vision on how mediation should be delivered to the benefit of businesses large and small and to society as a whole.

“By offering this service we are taking the best of what I and the panel have learned over the last 20 years and our intention is to provide the most cost-effective and efficient mediation service seen across the UK & Ireland.”

Stephen Ward, the managing director at Clerksroom, said that Ombudsman Services was leading by example in looking at how to enhance its service both commercially and with the customer’s best interests at heart.

“By working with our hugely responsive, experienced nationwide network of 500+ mediators, customers of the Ombudsman Service can access a consistently high quality service to help resolve commercial disputes as effectively as possible. Ultimately, the service will help businesses across the UK and Ireland to protect commercial relationships wherever possible and save them a great deal of time and money,” he said.

More information about the service is available on a new website.

Ombudsman Services was founded in 2002 to provide independent dispute resolution for the communications, energy, property and copyright licensing industries.

Mark Dugdale